Comparison of landowners according to the poem Dead Souls (Gogol N.V.)

Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol begins the so-called gallery of landowners with the landowner Manilov. Exactly to him main character goes first. The reader immediately notices the pretentious manners and sweetness of this man’s speech, although outwardly he is quite attractive. The meaning of Manilov’s whole life is fantastic dreams. He likes to lie on the sofa or sit in a rickety gazebo, dreaming of an underground passage. He is not at all concerned about the peasants suffering from the carelessness of this landowner. Manilov is a flatterer, in his words everyone in the city is “most kind.” As it turned out, the image of Manilov was so typical of that time that the concept of Manilovism arose.

Next in the gallery, Korobochka appears before the reader. Her life is an eternal accumulation. She is stingy and even stupid, since Chichikov has to spend both time and nerves to get her to sell the dead peasants. This image also turned out to be typical of Russian landowners of those times.

Nozdryov - an avid gambler and drunkard, brawler and reveler - calls himself a friend of Chichikov. Hot-tempered, boastful, this landowner is disorderly in character, which is reflected even in his home. There is some kind of chaos going on in the house, the owner himself keeps a real wolf cub, and there is also a goat in the stable. Nozdryov at first refuses to sell the peasants to Chichikov, and then plays checkers with him for dead souls. Of course, this cannot be done without cheating on the part of the owner. Chichikov, who is outraged by this, is saved from Nozdryov’s reprisal only by a visit from the police captain.

Sobakevich appears before the readers as a huge, clumsy landowner, rude and uncouth. The drive is also visible in it, just like in the Box. He speaks extremely unflatteringly about the townspeople, but praises his peasants. He is surprisingly calm about Chichikov’s request to buy peasants from him. Sobakevich himself is shown as a sort of ruler over the peasants.

The last landowner is Plyushkin. If in the person of Manilov the reader sees the process of an idle life, then Plyushkin is its result. This landowner is extremely rich, he has more than a thousand souls, but he lives in a dilapidated dwelling, dressed like a beggar. At heart he is also a hoarder, and this trait led him to lose his real perception of things. He is ready to save (and thereby spoil) food, just so as not to waste it. And the reader, studying the description of his dirty room, sees in front of him the spiritual death of a man - something to which the rest of the landowners are slowly but surely moving.

Images of landowners in the poem Dead Souls

Gogol, this excellent writer, very well described and showed the real essence of all rich people, mainly landowners. This is especially clearly expressed in his poem “ Dead souls" It is in this work of Gogol that it is clearly visible what people are not capable of for the sake of easy wealth. Landowners at that time in the nineteenth century in Russia played a very important role in the life of peasants and society in general. How many people have suffered because of the unimportant whims of these, oddly enough, illiterate people.

The landowners in Gogol's poem are shown with all the nakedness of their morals - real, not hypocritical. Landowners are people who profited from ordinary and poor people for their own benefit. For the peasants, it was like slavery, because they received neither money nor land, only kicks and reproaches, if not worse. The landowners were the head of the fortress, so this makes them even worse.

Gogol's poem "Dead Souls" shows how one landowner decided to make his wealth even greater, and therefore began to use even dead people, or rather, their name and age, supposedly they actually exist, and are in his krepatstva, that is, in his service on the estate. None of the auditors in general could have known whether those people were alive or not - but the landowner received incredible benefits for this.

Gogol shows how insignificant people can be, and it doesn’t matter whether they are landowners or not. In this work, the landowners decided to profit even from dead souls people who have already left this world. But even they were not left alone; even here they decided to gain some benefit for themselves.

That is why Gogol could not sleep peacefully until he showed the real essence of all landowners, who are not real rich people, but those who profit from everything they can.

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Sections: Literature

1. Summarize students' knowledge about landowners poems, to identify what is typical in them, what unites them into the gallery of dead souls, modern meaning such concepts as “Manilovschina”, “Nozdrevschina” and others;
2. Show the educational meaning of the poem;
3. Continue to develop the ability to convincingly defend your own opinion.

Equipment:

1. Portrait of N.V. Gogol.
2. Portraits of landowners.
3. Critics' statements.

Forms of work. Different models of joint activities are presented: collective, group, individual.

Indeed, each of us
no matter how good a person he is,
if he examines himself with that impartiality,
with which he delves into others, -
then he will certainly find it in himself,
to a greater or lesser extent,
many of the elements of many of Gogol's heroes.

V.G. Belinsky

Lesson progress

I. Organizational moment.

II. Work on the topic:

The topic of today's lesson is “Gallery of images of landowners in N.V. Gogol’s poem “Dead Souls”. The word “gallery” in a figurative meaning means “a long row, a string of types,” which means that the goal of our lesson is to find what is common to N.V. Gogol’s landowners, to answer the question of why they are united in one gallery of types, although Each of the landowners Chichikov meets has his own, sharply defined individuality. We are also familiar with the concept of “type”. A type is an image containing characteristic features any group of people. When using the word “type,” we mean that property of a character that allows us to see many familiar people in him. This has a direct bearing on the heroes of Dead Souls.

V.G. Belinsky wrote: “Indeed, each of us, no matter how good a person he is, if he delves into with the impartiality with which he delves into others, he will certainly find in himself, to a greater or lesser extent, many of the elements many of Gogol’s heroes.”

Thus, the heroes of N.V. Gogol have, on the one hand, universal significance, on the other hand, they are landowners of a certain era and representatives of broad strata of feudal Russia.

1. So, what, in your opinion, unites all the landowners depicted by N.V. Gogol? (Students' answers)

2. You presented different opinions on what unites landowners. Information about the techniques that Gogol uses to reveal the images of landowners will help deepen your knowledge.

All portraits of landowners are given in chapters arranged in a certain order. What is the point of this arrangement of chapters?

Manilov
Box
Nozdryov
Sobakevich
Plyushkin

Do negative qualities gradually increase in the characters? Or are they, the heroes, presented to the reader according to the principle of contrast? Sentimental Manilov is the grounded Korobochka, the collector Korobochka is the spender Nozdryov, the fist Sobakevich and the hole in humanity Plyushkin:

Manilov – Korobochka
Box – Nozdryov
Sobakevich – Plyushkin

Sample answer: Gogol gives these chapters in a certain order. The economicless landowner Manilov (Chapter 2) is replaced by the dreamy hoarder Korobochka (Chapter 3), the careless playmaker Nozdryov (Chapter 4) is replaced by the tight-fisted Sobakevich (Chapter 5). This gallery is completed by Plyushkin, a miser who brought his estate and peasants to complete ruin. Even the strong farms of Korobochka and Sobakevich are in fact unviable, since such forms of farming have already become obsolete.

The “portrait chapters” show even more clearly the picture of the moral decline of the landowner class. From the idle dreamer living in the world of his dreams Manilov to the club-headed Korobochka, from her to the reckless spendthrift, liar and cheater Nozdryov, then to the hardened fist Sobakevich and, finally, to Plyushkin, who has lost all moral qualities (“a hole in humanity”), Gogol leads us , showing an increasing moral decline and decomposition of representatives of the landowner world.

3. We found out how composition helps to understand the characters’ characters and their spiritual declaration.

4. But the speech of the heroes also perfectly characterizes the landowners. Gogol uses speech characterization as a method of sharpening characters.

Answer from pre-prepared students: Gogol has a multi-layered characterization of his heroes: through his things, through his attitude towards people, through his own speech. Manilov's speech is striking in its emptiness of content. Here is one of the samples of his speech: “Of course, it would be a different matter if the neighborhood were good, if, for example, there was a person with whom in some way you could talk about courtesy, about good treatment, follow some kind of science so that it would stir the soul, it would, so to speak, give the guy something…”. Manilov's speech is similar to himself. The same sweet, vague, meaningless.

Korobochka’s speech is primitive in content and form, full of words and phrases from the village vernacular: theirs, underwear, nothing, manenko, how you slept, sip some tea, put down a fight, buttered up the assessor. Characteristic is the cordial “father”, “my father”, with which she addresses Chichikov like a hospitable hostess. Her speech is characterized by intonations of complaint and uncertainty, natural in an old-world landowner who feels that living conditions are changing.

Nozdryov's speech, like himself, is characterized by swiftness and uncontrollability. His words run after each other, without any obligatory connection, without any logic: “... Lieutenant Kuvshinnikov... Oh, brother, what a dear man!... This, brother, will go to galbik, and to banchishka, and to everything you want . Eh, Chichikov, why should you come? Really, you're a sucker for this, you cattle breeder! Kiss me, soul, death I love you!...”

Nozdryov’s words are without internal censorship - like himself, without internal control.

Sobakevich's speech presents a sharp contrast to the speech of Manilov and Nozdryov. Sobakevich says “how he chops.” His remarks are laconic, his words and expressions are frankly rude. He does not tolerate verbosity, vague phrases, or inaccuracy in expressions. In response to Chichikov’s long speech about “non-existent” souls, Sobakevich, “without the slightest surprise, as if they were talking about bread,” asked: “Do you need dead souls? If you please, I’m ready to sell.”

Plyushkin's speech resembles continuous grumbling. With the exception of those cases when Plyushkin expresses his joy over an unexpected successful deal and a few more remarks imbued with human feelings, his speech is continuous complaints: complaints about poverty, about servants, about runaways, about relatives. His speech is peppered with swear words: what a face, he’s as stupid as a tree; fool, swindler, scoundrel, robbers; The devils will get you, you shameless parasites. At the same time, when speaking about inanimate objects, Plyushkin often uses diminutive and affectionate nouns: liqueur, decanter, glass, money, register. It is quite natural that the language of a landowner, who has been communicating with peasants for many years, is full of colloquial words and expressions: they beat, hefty fig, stuffed, poditka, ehva, I’ll take it down already.

5. So we have seen how composition and speech characteristic help Gogol to deeper reveal the characters’ characters, to show their complete impoverishment of soul. And taking into account what has already been said, let’s return to the question with which we began the lesson: what unites the landowners depicted by Gogol? I hope your initial opinions have also deepened.

Sample answer: They appeared before the reader as merchants with peasants. The fact that they trade not real, but dead souls does not soften the severity of the scenes painted by Gogol. On the contrary, it increases this severity. It turns out that all landowners, including such “nice” ones as Manilov, are ready not only to trade people, but also to make very dubious deals.

All of them are representatives of a class that occupies a high, leading role in society. They must be educated, enlightened, active, intelligent people and care about the interests of society.

In fact, we are faced with ignorant, narrow-minded ordinary people, whose lives are spent in empty chatter or empty activity (complete lack of spirituality, lack of high motives, dulling of all human feelings, lack of socially useful activities). They are all dead souls.

6. This is our conclusion. How did critics answer this question? Critics are divided on this issue. Some believe that “not a shadow of goodness, not a single bright thought, not a single human feeling is in them.” ( G.A.Gukovsky. Gogol's realism. 1959.)

Others argue that Gogol's heroes are neither virtuous nor vicious. These are “ordinary”, “average” people, but recreated with a unique – Gogol’s – “brightness, strength and size”; they are vulgar, but, according to these critics, in the first half of the 19th century the word “vulgar” meant “ordinary”; Gogol showed “the ordinariness of an ordinary person.”

(V.V. Kozhinov. Gogol's poem. 1995)

“Gogol takes Chichikov through the gauntlet of truly Russian people, each of whom is an epic figure. And Manilov, and Sobakevich, and Korobochka, and Plyushkin - they all came from the world of fairy tales. It is easy to recognize them as Koshchei the Immortal or Baba Yaga. ...Majestic in their passions and vices...these epic heroes represent Rus' as a fabulous, wonderful, absurd country. Madness replaces common sense and sober calculation for them. There is no norm here - only exceptions. Here every little thing is important and mysterious.” (P.L. Weil, A.A. Genis. Native speech. 1991)

Student responses: “I think these are ordinary people who still live today. Plyushkin and Korobochka are stingy to varying degrees; Manilov and Nozdrev are dreamers who do not know how to make their dreams come true, so they lie in order to elevate themselves in society. And Sobakevich is a person who thinks only about himself and his own benefit.”

“I agree with the opinion of Weil and Genis, because I also see fairy-tale images in Gogol’s landowners: Plyushkin - Koschey the Immortal; Box – Baba Yaga; Sobakevich - Bear, who came out of a Russian fairy tale; Manilov - the cat Bayun, luring him into his sleepy kingdom; Nozdryov is the epic Nightingale the Robber. The names of Gogol's heroes, like fairy-tale characters, have become household names. Just like the heroes of fairy tales, Gogol's landowners are simple and understandable to the reader, who seems to be returning to childhood when reading about the evil Koshchei or the clumsy Mikhail Potapych. As in fairy tales, the environment in the characters’ homes also plays an important role. For example, Korobochka’s house, which contains potions and decoctions, in our imagination immediately becomes Baba Yaga’s hut, and Plyushkin’s house, with its mustiness, dampness, and dust, becomes the palace of Kashchei the Immortal.”

(Students prepared the answer to this question as a homework assignment.

Answers that coincided with the traditional point of view are not presented here.)

7. Gogol himself also speaks about the typicality of his heroes in lyrical digressions. (Speech by a previously prepared student)

8. The fact that Gogol’s characters are typical of that time is confirmed by Pushkin’s novel “Eugene Onegin”. Let us remember the scene of the guests arriving at Tatyana Larina’s name day:

With his portly wife
Fat Pustyakov arrived;
Gvozdin, an excellent owner,
Owner of poor men;
The Skotinins, the gray-haired couple,
With children of all ages, counting
From thirty to two years;
District dandy Petushkov,
My cousin, Buyanov,
In down, in a cap with a visor
(As you know him, of course)
And retired lieutenant Flyanov,
Heavy gossip, old rogue,
Glutton, bribe taker and buffoon.

How are Gogol's heroes similar to the characters in Pushkin's novel? ( Students' answersc)

9. But it turns out that in modern society such types of people as the heroes of N.V. Gogol are alive. What is the modern meaning of the images of landowners “Dead Souls”? (Students' answers)

III. Final words from the teacher.

So, guys, today in class there was a conversation about the typicality of Gogol’s heroes for that time and for ours, it’s not for nothing that the epigraph is the words of V.G. Belinsky. Your opinions are divided, and rightly so: as many people, as many opinions.

I wish you were not like these heroes.

An essay based on the work Dead Souls by Gogol: The plot about “dead souls” in the shower is good. because it gives you complete freedom to travel around with the hero. Chichikov's unity with the gallery of landowner images is expressed in another. despite the existence in it of “ladies pleasant in all respects. Litra.RU: Gallery of landowners in N.V. Gogol’s poem “Dead Souls” Dead Souls Gogol N.V. Download the essay. Manilov is a parody of the hero of sentimental novels, and his groundless dreams and... Let us note: all landowners before Plyushkin have no past. ...could not attract the author of “Dead Souls” where the hero meanders through the provinces. Nozdryov is most like Manilov: they are related.

Gallery of landowners in N.V. Gogol’s poem “Dead Souls.

An essay based on the work Dead Souls by Gogol: Images of Living and Dead Souls in Gogol’s poem. For her, as for all landowners, serfs are a commodity. Central hero poems - Pavel Ivanovich Chichikov - typical. What he has in common with the masters of life is the meanness and vulgarity of his nature. The general meaning of images of landowners, techniques of satirical depiction. #9830 How are landowners different and what do they have in common? this hero right down to last chapter the first volume remains a mystery to everyone - not only to. An example of an essay on the topic: The image of Chichikov in the novel “Dead Souls.”

“Try to remember in detail the plot and ending of Dubrovsky,” one of the researchers noted. - This is much more difficult than forgetting at least one landowner from Dead Souls. Indeed, in developing the characters of the poem, Gogol showed unprecedented skill.

Manilov, Sobakevich, Nozdrev, Korobochka, Plyushkin... These names have become household names. Such a listing of them looks somehow unnatural: is it really possible to put such different characters? Let's try to give brief description landowners from Dead Souls.

Manilov is a philanthropist, projector, slacker. Sobakevich is a misanthrope, a fist, a burnout. Nozdryov is a swindler, gambler, spendthrift. Korobochka is a prude, a dumbass. Plyushkin is a miser, a misanthrope, a hoarder. What different characteristics, right?

In my opinion, the characters of the landowners are described in such a way that they form pairs of opposites: Manilov - Sobakevich, Nozdrev - Plyushkin. The only landowner in the poem, Korobochka, looks like an intermediate link between them.

It would be natural if the negative traits of one character were balanced positive features another. But Gogol does not do this: Manilov’s empty philanthropy is opposed by Sobakevich’s obvious misanthropy, Nozdryov’s wild extravagance is opposed by Plyushkin’s insane passion for hoarding. Each landowner is a kind of moralizing illustration, a “passion man,” that is, the embodiment of a particular negative quality. This is the structural similarity of the characters in Dead Souls. The images of the comedy of classicism were constructed in approximately the same way. For example, in Moliere: Tartuffe is a hypocrite, Jourdain is a stupid arrogant, etc.

Gogol worked at a time when the method of critical realism was emerging, which became a logical continuation of Enlightenment classicism. New artistic method made it possible not only to develop the characters’ characters in detail, but also to make deep generalizations. However, from the material of “Dead Souls” it is noticeable that Gogol was not ready to make far-reaching

Social conclusions, as Soviet literary scholars tried to prove. His abstract “Rus,” which Gogol never tires of referring to, is nothing more than a utopia invented by the writer himself in distant Italy. At the same time, what is especially curious is that the images of landowners constitute a kind of dystopia, which bears little resemblance to the real picture Russian life that era. The landowners of “Dead Souls” are exotic creations of the writer’s imagination; they could only have very distant prototypes. Here the difference between the images of landowners becomes noticeable, which lies in the degree of harm that each of them is capable of causing to society. Manilov and Sobakevich are harmless in themselves. Only many Manilovs and Sobakevichs are capable of causing any noticeable damage: the former through their mismanagement, the latter through greed. But Nozdryov and Plyushkin are not like that. They are an active destructive force. Plyushkin’s terrifying example, “the holes in humanity,” can be contagious in a society where there is exploitation of man by man and there are no strong moral foundations. Nozdryov, with his pathological passion for the game in all its manifestations, is even more dangerous: for him nothing is sacred, and his example is much more infectious than the example of Plyushkin. Note that in Russia in the 19th century, the hobby gambling among the nobility led to the ruin of the richest estates...

However, everything stated above is just one of the possible points of view on this topic. But let’s not forget that Gogol paid great attention to the didactic significance of his poem, although he would hardly have been able to answer the question “What do Gogol’s landowners have in common and how are they different from each other?”

In this article we will describe the image of landowners created by Gogol in the poem “Dead Souls”. The table we have compiled will help you remember the information. We will sequentially talk about the five heroes presented by the author in this work.

The image of landowners in the poem “Dead Souls” by N.V. Gogol is briefly described in the following table.

Gogol's portrayal of landowners

In the works of Nikolai Vasilyevich, one of the main themes is the landowner class in Russia, as well as the ruling class (nobility), its role in the life of society and its fate.

The main method used by Gogol to portray various characters is satire. The process of gradual degeneration of the landowner class was reflected in the heroes created by his pen. Nikolai Vasilyevich reveals shortcomings and vices. Gogol's satire is colored with irony, which helped this writer speak directly about what was impossible to talk about openly under censorship conditions. At the same time, Nikolai Vasilyevich’s laughter seems good-natured to us, but he does not spare anyone. Each phrase has a subtext, a hidden, deep meaning. Irony is generally a characteristic element of Gogol's satire. It is present not only in the speech of the author himself, but also in the speech of the heroes.

Irony is one of the essential features of Gogol’s poetics; it adds greater realism to the narrative and becomes a means of analyzing the surrounding reality.

Compositional structure of the poem

The images of landowners in the poem, the largest work of this author, are presented in the most multifaceted and complete way. It is constructed as the story of the adventures of the official Chichikov, who buys up “dead souls.” The composition of the poem allowed the author to tell about different villages and the owners living in them. Almost half of the first volume (five out of eleven chapters) is devoted to the characteristics of different types of landowners in Russia. Nikolai Vasilyevich created five portraits, not similar friends on each other, however, in each of them at the same time there are features that are typical of the Russian serf owner. Acquaintance with them begins with Manilov and ends with Plyushkin. This construction is not accidental. There is a logic to this sequence: the process of impoverishment of a person’s personality deepens from one image to another, it unfolds more and more as scary picture collapse of serf society.

Meeting Manilov

Manilov - representing the image of landowners in the poem "Dead Souls". The table only briefly describes it. Let us introduce you closer to this hero. The character of Manilov, which is described in the first chapter, is already manifested in the surname itself. The story about this hero begins with an image of the village of Manilovka, which is capable of “luring” few people with its location. The author describes with irony the master's courtyard, created as an imitation with a pond, bushes and the inscription "Temple of Solitary Reflection." External details help the writer create the image of the landowners in the poem "Dead Souls".

Manilov: character of the hero

The author, speaking about Manilov, exclaims that only God knows what kind of character this man had. By nature he is kind, courteous, polite, but all this takes on ugly, exaggerated forms in his image. sentimental and beautiful to the point of cloying. The relationships between people seem festive and idyllic to him. Various relationships, in general, are one of the details that create the image of the landowners in the poem “Dead Souls”. Manilov did not know life at all; reality was replaced by empty fantasy. This hero loved to dream and reflect, sometimes even about things useful to the peasants. However, his ideas were far from the needs of life. He did not know about the real needs of the serfs and never even thought about them. Manilov considers himself a bearer of culture. He was considered the most educated man in the army. Nikolai Vasilyevich speaks ironically about the house of this landowner, in which there was always “something missing,” as well as about his sugary relationship with his wife.

Chichikov's conversation with Manilov about buying dead souls

In an episode of a conversation about buying dead souls, Manilov is compared to an overly smart minister. Gogol's irony here intrudes, as if accidentally, into a forbidden area. Such a comparison means that the minister is not so different from Manilov, and “Manilovism” is a typical phenomenon of the vulgar bureaucratic world.

Box

Let us describe another image of landowners in the poem “Dead Souls”. The table has already briefly introduced you to Korobochka. We learn about her in the third chapter of the poem. Gogol classifies this heroine as one of the small landowners who complain about losses and crop failures and always keep their heads somewhat to one side, while collecting money little by little into bags placed in the chest of drawers. This money is obtained by selling a variety of subsistence products. Korobochka's interests and horizons are completely focused on her estate. Her entire life and economy are patriarchal in nature.

How did Korobochka react to Chichikov’s proposal?

The landowner realized that trade dead souls profitable, and agreed after much persuasion to sell them. The author, describing the image of landowners in the poem “Dead Souls” (Korobochka and other heroes), is ironic. For a long time, the “club-headed” one cannot figure out what exactly is required of her, which infuriates Chichikov. After that, she bargains with him for a long time, afraid of making a mistake.

Nozdryov

In the image of Nozdryov in the fifth chapter, Gogol depicts a completely different form of decomposition of the nobility. This hero is a man of what is called a “jack of all trades.” In his very face there was something daring, direct, open. He is also characterized by a “breadth of nature.” According to the ironic remark of Nikolai Vasilyevich, Nozdryov is a “historical man”, since not a single meeting that he managed to attend was ever complete without stories. He loses a lot of money at cards with a light heart, beats a simpleton at a fair and immediately “squanders it all.” This hero is an utter liar and a reckless braggart, a true master of “casting bullets.” He behaves defiantly everywhere, if not aggressively. This character’s speech is replete with swear words, and he has a passion for “spoiling his neighbor.” Gogol created in Russian literature a new socio-psychological type of so-called Nozdrevism. In many ways, the image of landowners in the poem “Dead Souls” is innovative. A brief image of the following heroes is described below.

Sobakevich

The author’s satire in the image of Sobakevich, whom we meet in the fifth chapter, takes on a more accusatory character. This character bears little resemblance to previous landowners. This is a tight-fisted, cunning tradesman, a “kulak landowner.” He is alien to the violent extravagance of Nozdryov, the dreamy complacency of Manilov, as well as Korobochka’s hoarding. Sobakevich has an iron grip, he is taciturn, he is on his own mind. There are few people who could deceive him. Everything about this landowner is strong and durable. In all the everyday objects surrounding him, Gogol finds a reflection of the character traits of this person. Everything surprisingly resembles the hero himself in his house. Each thing, as the author notes, seemed to say that she was “also Sobakevich.”

Nikolai Vasilyevich portrays a figure that amazes with its rudeness. This man seemed to Chichikov to look like a bear. Sobakevich is a cynic who is not ashamed of moral ugliness in others or in himself. He is far from enlightened. This is a die-hard serf owner who only cares about his own peasants. It is interesting that, except for this hero, no one understood the true essence of the “scoundrel” Chichikov, but Sobakevich perfectly understood the essence of the proposal, reflecting the spirit of the times: everything can be sold and bought, the maximum benefit should be obtained. This is the generalized image of the landowners in the poem of the work, however, it is not limited to the depiction of only these characters. We present to you the next landowner.

Plyushkin

The sixth chapter is dedicated to Plyushkin. On it, the characteristics of the landowners in the poem “Dead Souls” are completed. The name of this hero has become a household word, denoting moral degradation and stinginess. This image is the last degree of degeneration of the landowner class. Gogol begins his acquaintance with the character, as usual, with a description of the estate and village of the landowner. At the same time, a “particular disrepair” was noticeable on all the buildings. Nikolai Vasilyevich describes a picture of the ruin of a once rich serf owner. Its cause is not idleness and extravagance, but the painful stinginess of the owner. Gogol calls this landowner “a hole in humanity.” Its very appearance is characteristic - it is a sexless creature resembling a housekeeper. This character no longer causes laughter, only bitter disappointment.

Conclusion

The image of landowners in the poem “Dead Souls” (the table is presented above) is revealed by the author in many ways. The five characters that Gogol created in the work depict the diverse state of this class. Plyushkin, Sobakevich, Nozdrev, Korobochka, Manilov are different forms of one phenomenon - spiritual, social and economic decline. The characteristics of landowners in Gogol's poem "Dead Souls" prove this.