Who lives well on the race summary. Who can live well in Rus'?

Everyone left the house on business, but during the argument they did not notice how evening came. They had already gone far from their homes, about thirty miles, and decided to rest until the sunshine. They lit a fire and sat down to feast. They argued again, defending their point of view, and ended up in a fight.

Prologue

In what year - calculate

In what land - guess

On the sidewalk

Seven men came together:

Seven temporarily obliged,

A tightened province,

Terpigoreva County,

Empty parish,

From adjacent villages:

Zaplatova, Dyryavina,

Razutova, Znobishina,

Gorelova, Neelova -

The harvest is also bad,

They came together and argued:

Who has fun?

Free in Rus'?

Roman said: to the landowner,

Demyan said: to the official,

Luke said: ass.

To the fat-bellied merchant! -

The Gubin brothers said,

Ivan and Metrodor.

Old man Pakhom pushed

And he said, looking at the ground:

To the noble boyar,

To the sovereign minister.

And Prov said: to the king...

The guy is a bull: get involved

What a whim in the head -

Stake her from there

You can’t knock them out: they resist,

Everyone stands on their own!

Everyone left the house on business, but during the argument they did not notice how evening came. They had already gone far from their homes, about thirty miles, and decided to rest until the sunshine. They lit a fire and sat down to feast. They argued again, defending their point of view, and ended up in a fight. The tired men decided to go to bed, but then Pakhomushka caught a chick warbler and began to daydream: if only he could fly around Rus' on his wings and find out; Who lives “fun and at ease in Rus'?” And every man adds that they don’t need wings, but if they had food, they would go around Rus' with their own feet and find out the truth. A flying warbler asks to let her chick go, and for this she promises a “large ransom”: she will give them a self-assembled tablecloth that will feed them on the way, and she will also give them clothes and shoes.

The peasants sat down by the tablecloth and vowed not to return home until they “found a solution” to their dispute.

Part one

Chapter I

The men are walking along the road, and all around is “inconvenient”, “abandoned land”, everything is flooded with water, no wonder “it snowed every day.” Along the way they meet the same peasants, only in the evening they met a priest. The peasants took off their hats and blocked his way, the priest was afraid, but they told him about their dispute. They ask the priest to answer them “without laughter and without cunning.” Pop says:

“What do you think is happiness?

Peace, wealth, honor?

Isn’t that right, dear friends?”

“Now let's see, brothers,

What’s the peace like?”

From birth, teaching was difficult for Popovich:

Our roads are difficult,

Our parish is large.

Sick, dying,

Born into the world

They don’t choose time:

In reaping and haymaking,

In the dead of autumn night,

In winter, in severe frosts,

And in the spring flood -

Go wherever you are called!

You go unconditionally.

And even if only the bones

Alone broke, -

No! Every time it gets wet,

The soul will hurt.

Don't believe it, Orthodox Christians,

There is a limit to habit:

No heart carrying out

Without any trepidation

Death rattle

Funeral lament

Orphan's sadness!

Then the priest tells how they mock the priest’s tribe, mocking priests and priests. Thus, there is no peace, no honor, no money, the parishes are poor, the landowners live in the cities, and the peasants abandoned by them are in poverty. Not like them, but the priest sometimes gives them money, because... they are dying of hunger. Having told his sad story, the priest drove off, and the peasants scolded Luka, who was shouting out to the priest. Luke stood, kept silent,

I was afraid wouldn't have imposed it

Comrades, stand by.

Chapter II

RURAL FAIR

No wonder the peasants scold spring: there is water all around, there is no greenery, the cattle must be driven out to the field, but there is still no grass. They walk past empty villages, wondering where all the people have gone. The “kid” we meet explains that everyone has gone to the village of Kuzminskoye for the fair. The men also decide to go there to look for someone happy. A trading village is described, quite dirty, with two churches: Old Believer and Orthodox, there is a school and a hotel. A rich fair is noisy nearby. People drink, party, have fun and cry. The Old Believers are angry at the dressed-up peasants, they say that there is “dog blood” in the red calicoes they wear, so there will be hunger! Wanderers

walk around the fair and admire different goods. A crying old man comes across: he drank his money and has nothing to buy his granddaughter’s shoes, but he promised, and the granddaughter is waiting. Pavlusha Veretennikov, the “master,” helped Vavila out and bought shoes for his granddaughter. The old man, out of joy, even forgot to thank his benefactor. There is also a bookshop here that sells all sorts of nonsense. Nekrasov exclaims bitterly:

Eh! eh! will the time come,

When (come, desired one!..)

They will let the peasant understand

What a rose is a portrait of a portrait,

What is the book of the book of roses?

When a man is not Blucher

And not my foolish lord -

Belinsky and Gogol

Will it come from the market?

Oh, people, Russian people!

Orthodox peasants!

Have you ever heard

Are you these names?

Those are great names,

They wore them glorified

People's intercessors!

Here's some portraits of them for you

Hang in your gorenki,

The wanderers went to the booth “...To listen, to look. // Comedy with Petrushka,.. // The resident, the policeman // Not in the eyebrow, but right in the eye!” By evening the wanderers “left the bustling village”

Chapter III

DRUNKEN NIGHT

Everywhere men see returning, sleeping drunks. Fragmentary phrases, snatches of conversations and songs rush from all sides. A drunk guy buries a zipun in the middle of the road and is sure that he is burying his mother; there are men fighting, drunk women in the ditch swearing, whose house is the worst - The road is crowded

What later is uglier:

More and more often they come across

Beaten, crawling,

Lying in a layer.

At the tavern, the peasants met Pavlusha Veretennikov, who bought the peasant shoes for his granddaughter. Pavlusha recorded peasant songs and said, What

“Russian peasants are smart,

One thing is bad

That they drink until they are stupefied...”

But one drunk shouted: “And we work harder... // And we work more sober.”

Peasant food is sweet,

The whole century saw an iron saw

He chews but doesn't eat!

You work alone

And the work is almost over,

Look, there are three shareholders standing:

God, king and lord!

There is no measure for Russian hops.

Have they measured our grief?

Is there a limit to the work?

A man does not measure troubles

Copes with everything

No matter what, come.

A man, working, does not think,

That will strain your strength,

So really over a glass

Think about it what's too much

Will you end up in a ditch?

To regret - regret skillfully,

To the master's measure

Don't kill the peasant!

Not gentle white-handed ones,

And we are great people

At work and at play!

“Write: In the village of Bosovo

Yakim Nagoy lives,

He works himself to death

He drinks until he’s half dead!..”

Yakim lived in St. Petersburg, but decided to compete with the “merchant”, so he ended up in prison. Since then, for thirty years, he has been “roasting on the strip in the sun.” He once bought pictures for his son and hung them on the walls of the house. Yakima had “thirty-five rubles” saved up. There was a fire, he should have saved money, but he began collecting pictures. The rubles have merged into a lump, now they give eleven rubles for them.

The peasants agree with Yakim:

“Drinking means we feel strong!

Great sadness will come,

How can we stop drinking!..

Work wouldn't stop me

Trouble would not prevail

Hops will not overcome us!”

Then a daring Russian song “about Mother Volga”, “about maiden beauty” burst out.

The wandering peasants refreshed themselves at the self-assembled tablecloth, left Roman on guard at the bucket, and they themselves went to look for the happy one.

Chapter IV

HAPPY

In a loud crowd, festive

The wanderers walked

They shouted the cry:

"Hey! Is there a happy one somewhere?

Show up! If it turns out

That you live happily

We have a ready-made bucket:

Drink for free as much as you like -

We'll treat you to glory!..”

Many people gathered “hunters to take a sip of free wine.”

The sexton who came said that happiness lies in “compassion,” but he was driven away. The “old old woman” came and said that she was happy: in the fall, she had grown up to a thousand turnips on a small ridge. They laughed at her, but did not give her vodka. A soldier came and said, that he is happy

“...What's in twenty battles

I was, not killed!

I walked neither full nor hungry,

But he didn’t give in to death!

I was beaten mercilessly with sticks,

But even if you feel it, it’s alive!”

The soldier was given a drink:

You are happy - there is no word!

The “Olonchan stonemason” came to boast of his strength. They brought it to him too. A man came with shortness of breath and advised the Olonchan man not to boast about his strength. He was also strong, but he overstrained himself, lifting fourteen pounds to the second floor. A “yard man” came and boasted that he was the beloved slave of the boyar Peremetevo and was sick with a noble disease - “according to this, I am a nobleman.” “It’s called po-da-groy!” But the men did not bring him a drink. A “yellow-haired Belarusian” came and said that he was happy because he was eating plenty of rye bread. A man came “with a curled cheekbone.” Three of his comrades were broken by bears, but he is alive. They brought it to him. The beggars came and boasted of the happiness that they were served everywhere.

Our wanderers realized

That they wasted vodka for nothing.

By the way, and a bucket,

End. “Well, it will be yours!

Hey, man's happiness!

Leaky with patches,

Humpbacked with calluses,

Go home!”

They advise men to look for Yermil Girin - that’s who is happy. Yermil kept a mill. They decided to sell it, Ermila bargained, and there was only one rival - the merchant Altynnikov. But Yermil outbid the miller. You just need to pay a third of the price, but Yermil didn’t have any money with him. He Asked for a half-hour delay. The court was surprised that he would make it in half an hour; he had to travel thirty-five miles to his home, but they gave him half an hour. Yermil came to the market square, and that day there was a market. Yermil turned to the people to give him a loan:

“Shut up, listen,

I’ll tell you my word!”

“Long ago the merchant Altynnikov

Went to the mill,

Yes, I didn’t make a mistake either,

I checked in the city five times,..”

Today I arrived “without a penny”, but they appointed a bargain and they laugh, What

(outwitted:

“Cunning, strong clerks,

And their world is stronger...”

“If you know Ermila,

If you believe Yermil,

So help me out, or something!..”

And a miracle happened -

Throughout the market square

Every peasant has

Like the wind half left

Suddenly it turned upside down!

The clerks were surprised

Altynnikov turned green,

When he's a full thousand

He put it on the table for them!..

The following Friday, Yermil “was counting on the people in the same square.” Although he did not write down how much he took from whom, “Yermil did not have to give an extra penny.” There was an extra ruble left, until the evening Yermil looked for the owner, and in the evening he gave it to the blind, because the owner could not be found. Wanderers are interested in how Yermil gained such authority among the people. About twenty years ago he was a clerk, helping peasants without extorting money from them. Then the entire estate chose Ermila as mayor. And Yermil served the people honestly for seven years, and then instead of his brother Mitri, he gave the widow’s son as a soldier. Out of remorse, Yermil wanted to hang himself. They returned the boy to the widow so that Yermil wouldn’t do anything to himself. No matter how much they asked him, he resigned from his position, rented a mill and grinded for everyone without deception. The wanderers want to find Ermila, but the priest said that he is in prison. There was a peasant revolt in the province, nothing helped, they called Ermila. The peasants believed him... but, without finishing the story, the narrator hurried home, promising to finish it later. Suddenly a bell was heard. The peasants rushed onto the road when they saw the landowner.

Chapter V

LANDLORD

This was the landowner Gavrila Afanasyevich Obolt-Obolduev. He got scared when he saw “seven tall men” in front of the troika, and, grabbing a pistol, began to threaten the men, but they told him that they were not robbers, but wanted to know if he was a happy person?

“Tell us in a divine way,

Is the life of a landowner sweet?

How are you - at ease, happily,

Landowner, are you living?”

“Having laughed his fill,” the landowner began to say that he was of ancient descent. His family began two hundred and fifty years ago through his father and three hundred years ago through his mother. There was a time, says the landowner, when everyone showed them honor, everything around was the property of the family. It used to be that holidays were held for a month at a time. What luxurious hunts there were in the fall! And he talks poetically about it. Then he remembers that he punished the peasants, but lovingly. But on Christ’s Resurrection he kissed everyone and did not disdain anyone. The peasants heard the funeral bells ringing. And the landowner said:

“They are not calling for the peasant!

Through life according to the landowners

They're calling!.. Oh, life is wide!

Sorry, goodbye forever!

Farewell to landowner Rus'!

Now Rus' is not the same!”

According to the landowner, his class has disappeared, estates are dying, forests are being cut down, the land remains uncultivated. People are drinking.

The literate people shout that they need to work, but the landowners are not used to it:

“I’ll tell you without bragging,

I live almost forever

In the village for forty years,

And from the rye ear

I can’t tell the difference between barley

And they sing to me: “Work!”

The landowner is crying because his comfortable life is over: “The great chain has broken,

It tore and splintered:

One way for the master,

Others don't care!..”

Part two

PEASANT WOMAN

Prologue

“Not everything is between men

Find the happy one

Let’s feel the women!” -

Our wanderers decided

And they began to question the women.

They said how they cut it:

“We don’t have this kind of thing,

And in the village of Klin:

Kholmogory cow

Not a woman! kinder

And smoother - there is no woman.

You ask Korchagina

Matryona Timofeevna,

She’s also the governor’s wife...”

Wanderers go and admire the bread and flax:

All garden vegetables

Ripe: children are running around

Some with turnips, some with carrots,

Sunflowers are peeled,

And the women are pulling beets,

Such a good beet!

Exactly red boots,

They lie on the strip.

The wanderers came across the estate. The gentlemen live abroad, the clerk is dead, and the servants wander around like restless people, looking to see what they can steal: They caught all the crucian carp in the pond.

The paths are so dirty

What a shame! the girls are stone

Noses are broken!

The fruits and berries have disappeared,

Geese and swans have disappeared

The lackey's got it in his craw!

Wanderers went from the manor's estate to the village. The wanderers sighed lightly:

They are after the whining yard

Seemed beautiful

healthy, singing

A crowd of reapers and reapers...

They met Matryona Timofeevna, for whom they had traveled a long way.

Matrena Timofeevna

dignified woman,

Wide and dense

About thirty-eight years old.

Beautiful; gray streaked hair,

The eyes are large, strict,

The richest eyelashes,

Severe and dark

She's wearing a white shirt,

Yes, the sundress is short,

Yes, a sickle over your shoulder.

“What do you need, fellows?”

The wanderers persuade the peasant woman to talk about her life. Matryona Timofeevna refuses:

“Our ears are already falling apart,

There aren’t enough hands, darlings.”

What are we doing, godfather?

Bring on the sickles! All seven

How will we be tomorrow - by evening

We will burn all your rye!

Then she agreed:

“I won’t hide anything!”

While Matryona Timofeevna was managing the household, the men sat down near the self-assembled tablecloth.

The stars were already seated

Across the dark blue sky,

The month has become high,

When the hostess came

And became our wanderers

“Open your whole soul...”

Chapter I

BEFORE MARRIAGE

I was lucky in the girls:

We had a good

Non-drinking family.

The parents cherished their daughter, but not for long. At the age of five, they began to accustom her to livestock, and from the age of seven she was already following the cow herself, bringing lunch to her father in the field, herding ducklings, going for mushrooms and berries, raking hay... There was enough work. She was a master at singing and dancing. Philip Korchagin, a “Petersburg resident”, a stove maker, wooed.

She grieved, cried bitterly,

And the girl did the job:

At the narrowed sideways

I looked secretly.

Beautifully ruddy, broad and mighty,

Rus hair, soft spoken -

Philip has fallen on his heart!

Matryona Timofeevna sings an old song and remembers her wedding.

Chapter II

SONGS

The wanderers sing along with Matryona Timofeevna.

The family was huge

Grumpy... I scratched

Happy maiden holiday to hell!

Her husband went to work, and she was told to endure her sister-in-law, father-in-law, and mother-in-law. The husband returned and Matryona cheered up.

Philip at the Annunciation

Gone and to Kazanskaya

I gave birth to a son.

What a handsome son he was! And then the master’s manager tormented him with his advances. Matryona rushed to grandfather Savely.

What to do! Teach!

Of all her husband’s relatives, only grandfather felt sorry for her.

Well, that's it! special speech

It would be a sin to remain silent about my grandfather.

He was lucky too...

Chapter III

SAVELIY, BOGATYR SVYATORUSSKY

Savely, Holy Russian hero.

With a huge gray mane,

Tea, twenty years uncut,

With a huge beard

Grandfather looked like a bear

Especially in the forest,

He bent over and went out.

At first she was afraid of him, that if he straightened up, he would hit the ceiling with his head. But he could not straighten up; he was said to be a hundred years old. Grandfather lived in a special upper room

Didn't like families...

He didn’t let anyone in, and his family called him “branded, a convict.” To which the grandfather cheerfully replied:

“Branded, but not a slave!”

Grandfather often made fun of his relatives. In the summer he foraged for mushrooms and berries, poultry and small animals in the forest, and in the winter he talked to himself on the stove. One day Matryona Timofeevna asked why he was called a branded convict? “I was a convict,” he answered.

Because he buried the German Vogel, the offender of the peasant, in the ground alive. He said that they lived freely among the dense forests. Only the bears bothered them, but they dealt with the bears. He lifted the bear onto his spear and tore his back. In her youth she was sick, but in her old age she was bent over and could not be straightened. The landowner called them to his city and forced them to pay rent. Under the rods, the peasants agreed to pay something. Every year the master called them that way, beat them mercilessly with rods, but had little to gain. When the old landowner was killed near Varna, his heir sent a German steward to the peasants. The German was quiet at first. If you can’t pay, don’t pay, but work, for example, dig a ditch in a swamp, cut a clearing. The German brought his family and ruined the peasants completely. They endured the steward for eighteen years. The German built a factory and ordered to dig a well. He came to dinner to scold the peasants, and they pushed him into a dug well and buried him. For this, Savely ended up in hard labor and escaped; he was returned and beaten mercilessly. He was in hard labor for twenty years and in a settlement for twenty years, where he saved up money. Returned home. When there was money, his relatives loved him, but now they spit in his eyes.

Chapter IV

GIRL

It is described how the tree burned, and with it the chicks in the nest. The birds were there to save the chicks. When she arrived, everything had already burned down. One little bird was crying,

Yes, I didn’t call the dead

Until white morning!..

Matryona Timofeevna says that she took her little son to work, but her mother-in-law scolded her and ordered him to leave him with his grandfather. While working in the field, she heard groans and saw her grandfather crawling:

Oh, poor young girl!

The daughter-in-law is the last one in the house,

The last slave!

Endure the great storm,

Take the extra beatings

And in the eyes of the foolish

Don't let the baby go!..

The old man fell asleep in the sun,

Fed Demidushka to the pigs

Silly grandfather!..

My mother almost died from grief. Then the judges arrived and began to interrogate the witnesses and Matryona whether she was in a relationship with Savely:

I answered in a whisper:

It's a shame, master, you're kidding!

I am an honest wife to my husband,

And to old Savely

A hundred years... Tea, you know it yourself.

They accused Matryona of colluding with the old man to kill her son, and Matryona only asked that her son’s body not be opened! Drive without reproach

Honest burial

Betray the baby!

Entering the upper room, she saw her son Savely reading prayers at the tomb, and drove him away, calling him a murderer. He loved the baby. Grandfather reassured her by saying that no matter how long a peasant lives, he suffers, but her Demushka is in heaven.

“...It’s easy for him, it’s light for him...”

Chapter V

WOLF

Twenty years have passed since then. The inconsolable mother suffered for a long time. Grandfather went to repentance in a monastery. Time passed, children were born every year, and three years later a new misfortune crept up - her parents died. Grandfather returned all white from repentance, and soon he died.

As ordered, they did it:

Buried next to Dema...

He lived one hundred and seven years.

When her son Fedot turned eight years old, he was sent to help as a shepherd. The shepherd left, and the she-wolf dragged away the sheep. Fedot first took the sheep away from the weakened she-wolf, and then saw that the sheep was already dead, and threw it back to the she-wolf. He came to the village and told everything himself. They wanted to flog Fedot for this, but his mother did not give it to him. Instead of her young son, she was flogged. Having seen off her son with the herd, Matryona cries, calls out to her dead parents, but she has no intercessors.

Chapter VI

DIFFICULT YEAR

There was hunger. The mother-in-law told the neighbors that it was all her fault, Matryona, because... I wore a clean shirt on Christmas Day.

For my husband, for my protector,

I got off cheap;

And one woman

Not for the same thing

Killed to death with stakes.

Don't joke with the hungry!..

We've barely managed to cope with the lack of bread, and the recruitment has arrived. But Matryona Timofeevna was not very afraid; a recruit had already been taken from the family. She stayed at home because... was pregnant and nursing last days. An upset father-in-law came and said that they were taking Philip as a recruit. Matryona Timofeevna realized that if they took her husband as a soldier, she and her children would disappear. She got up from the stove and went into the night.

Chapter VII

GOVERNOR

On a frosty night, Matryona Timofeevna prays and goes to the city. Arriving at the governor's house, she asks the doorman when she can come. The doorman promises to help her. Having learned that the governor’s wife was coming, Matryona Timofeevna threw herself at her feet and told her about her misfortune.

I didn't know what did you do

(Yes, apparently gave me some advice

Lady!..) How will I throw myself

At her feet: “Intercede!

By deception not divine

breadwinner and parent

They take it from the kids!”

The peasant woman lost consciousness, and when she woke up, she saw herself in rich chambers, with a “laid child” nearby.

Thanks to the governor

Elena Alexandrovna,

I'm so grateful to her

Like a mother!

She baptized the boy herself

And name: Liodorushka

Chosen for the baby...

Everything was clarified and my husband was returned.

Chapter VIII

Called lucky

Nicknamed the governor's wife

Matryona since then.

Now she rules the house, raises children: she has five sons, one has already been recruited... And then the peasant woman added: - And then, what are you up to

Not the point - between women

Happy searching!

What else do you need?

Shouldn't I tell you?

That we burned twice,

That god is anthrax

Visited us three times?

Horse attempts

We carried; I took a walk

Like a gelding in a harrow!..

I haven't trampled my feet,

Not tied with ropes,

No needles...

What else do you need?

For a mother scolded,

Like a trampled snake,

The blood of the firstborn has passed...

And you came looking for happiness!

It's a shame, well done!

Don't touch women,

What a god! you pass with nothing

To the grave!

One pilgrim pilgrim said:

“The keys to women's happiness,

From our free will

Abandoned lost

God himself!”

Part three

LAST

Chapters 1-III

On Peter's Day (29/VI), having passed through the villages, the wanderers came to the Volga. And here there are huge expanses of hayfields, and all the people are mowing.

Along the low bank,

On the Volga the grass is tall,

Fun mowing.

The wanderers could not stand it:

“We haven’t worked for a long time,

Let’s mow!”

Amused, tired,

We sat down to a haystack for breakfast...

Landowners with their retinue, children, and dogs arrived on three boats. Everyone went around the mowing and ordered to sweep away a huge stack of hay, supposedly damp. (The wanderers tried:

Dry senso!)

The wanderers are surprised why the landowner behaves this way, because the order is already new, but he is fooling around in the old way. The peasants explain that the hay is not his,

and “patrimony”.

The wanderers, unrolling the self-assembled tablecloth, talk with the old man Vla-sushka, ask him to explain why the peasants please the landowner, and learn: “Our landowner is special,

Exorbitant wealth

An important rank, a noble family,

I've been weird and foolish all my life...”

And when he learned about the “will,” he was seized with a blow. Now the left half is paralyzed. Having somehow recovered from the blow, the old man believed that the peasants had been returned to the landowners. His heirs deceive him so that he does not deprive them of their rich inheritance in their hearts. The heirs persuaded the peasants to “amuse” the master, but the slave Ipat did not need to be persuaded, he loves the master for his favors and serves not out of fear, but out of conscience. What kind of “mercies” does Ipat remember: “How small I was, our prince

me with my own hand

Harnessed the cart;

I have reached a frisky youth:

The prince came on vacation

And, having had a walk, redeemed

Me, the latter's slave,

In winter in the ice hole!..”

And then in a snowstorm he forced Prov, who was riding a horse, to play the violin, and when he fell, the prince ran over him with a sleigh:

“...They pressed their chest”

The heirs agreed with the estate as follows:

“Keep silent, take a bow

Don't contradict the sick man,

We will reward you:

For extra work, for corvée,

For even a swear word -

We will pay you for everything.

The hearty one cannot live long,

Probably two or three months,

The doctor himself announced!

Respect us, listen to us,

We are watering meadows for you

We’ll give it along the Volga;..”

Things almost went wrong. Vlas, being a mayor, did not want to bow to the old man and resigned from his post. A volunteer was immediately found - Klimka Lavin - but he is such a thieving and empty person that they left Vlas as mayor, and Klimka Lavin turns and bows in front of the master.

Every day the landowner drives around the village, picking on the peasants, and they:

“Let's get together - laughter! Everyone has

Your own tale about the holy fool...”

The master receives orders, one more stupid than the other: to marry the widow Terentyeva Gavrila Zhokhov: the bride is seventy, and the groom is six years old. A herd of cows passing in the morning woke up the master, so he ordered the shepherds to “calm down the cows from now on.” Only the peasant Agap did not agree to indulge the master, and “then in the middle of the day he was caught with the master’s log. Agap got tired of listening to the master’s swearing, he responded. The landowner ordered Agap to be punished in front of everyone. The master could not move from the porch, and Agap in the stable simply yelled:

“Neither give nor take under the rods

Agap shouted, fooled around,

Until I finished the damask:

How they took him out of the stables

He's dead drunk

Four men

So the master even took pity:

"It's your own fault, Agapushka!" -

He said kindly...”

To which Vlas the narrator remarked:

“Praise the grass in the stack,

And the master is in a coffin!”

“Get away from the master

The ambassador is coming: we've eaten!

He must be calling the headman,

I’ll go and look at the gum!”

The landowner asked the mayor whether the haymaking would be finished soon, he replied that in two or three days all the master's hay would be harvested. “And ours will wait!” The landowner spent an hour saying that the peasants would always be landowners: “to be squeezed into a handful!..” The mayor makes loyal speeches that pleased the landowner, for which Klim was offered a glass of “overseas wine.” Then the Last One wanted his sons and daughters-in-law to dance, and ordered the blond lady: “Sing, Lyuba!” The lady sang well. The last one fell asleep to the song, they carried him sleepily into the boat, and the gentlemen sailed away. In the evening the peasants learned that the old prince had died,

But their joy is Vakhlatsky

It didn't last long.

With the death of the Last One

The lordly weasel has disappeared:

They didn’t let me get a hangover

Vahlakam Guards!

And for the meadows

Heirs with peasants

They are reaching out to this day.

Vlas we intercede for the peasants,

Lives in Moscow... was in St. Petersburg...

But there’s no point!

Part four

PIR - TO THE WHOLE WORLD

Dedicated

Sergei Petrovich Botkin

Introduction

On the outskirts of the village “There was a feast, a great feast1” His sons, seminarians: Savvushka and Grisha, came with the sexton Tryfon.

...At Gregory's

Thin face pale

And the hair is thin, curly,

With a hint of red

Simple guys, kind.

Mowed, stung, sowed

And drank vodka on holidays

On a par with the peasantry.

The men sit and think:

Own flood meadows

Hand it over to the headman - as a tax.

The men ask Grisha to sing. He sings “happy”.

Chapter I

BITTER TIME - BITTER SONGS

Cheerful

The landowner took a cow from the peasant's yard, the chickens were taken and eaten by the zemstvo court. The boys will grow up a little: “The king will take the boys, // Master -

daughters!”

Then everyone burst into song together

Corvee

A beaten man seeks solace in a pub. A man driving by said that they were beaten for swear words until they achieved silence. Then Vikenty Aleksandrovich, a yard man, told his story.

About an exemplary slave - Jacob the faithful

He lived for thirty years in the village of Polivanov, who bought the village with bribes and did not know his neighbors, but only his sister. He was cruel to his relatives, not only to the peasants. He married his daughter, and then, after beating her, he and her husband kicked out without anything. The servant Yakov hit his teeth with his heel.

People of servile rank -

Real dogs sometimes:

The heavier the punishment

That's why gentlemen are dearer to them.

Yakov appeared like this from his youth,

Yakov had only joy:

To care for the master, to take care of him, please

Yes, rock my little nephew.

All his life Yakov was with his master, they grew old together. The master's legs refused to walk.

Yakov himself will carry him out and lay him down,

He himself will take the long distance to his sister,

He will help you get to the old lady yourself.

So they lived happily - for the time being.

Jacob's nephew, Grisha, grew up and threw himself at the master's feet, asking to marry Irisha. And the master himself looked for her for himself. He handed over Grisha as a recruit. Yakov was offended and made a fool. “I’m dead drunk...” Those who don’t approach the master, but they can’t please him. Two weeks later, Yakov returned, allegedly feeling sorry for the landowner. Everything went as before. We were getting ready to go to the master’s sister. Yakov turned off-road into the Devil's Ravine, unharnessed the horses, and the master was afraid for his life and began to beg Yakov to spare him, he replied:

“I found the murderer!

I will dirty my hands with murder,

No, it’s not for you to die!”

Yakov himself hanged himself in front of the master. The master toiled all night, and in the morning a hunter found him. The master returned home, repenting:

“I am a sinner, a sinner! Execute me!”

Having told a couple more scary stories, the men argued: who is more sinful - the innkeepers, the landowners or the men? We got into a fight. And then Ionushka, who had been silent all evening, said:

And so I will make peace between you!”

Chapter II

Wanderers and pilgrims

There are many beggars in Rus', entire villages went “begging” in the fall, there are many among them rogues who know how to get along with the landowners. But there are also believing pilgrims, whose labors raise money for churches. They remembered the holy fool Fomushka, who lived like a god, and there was also the Old Believer Kropilnikov:

Old man, whose whole life

Either freedom or prison.

And there was also Evfrosinyushka, a townsman widow; she appeared in cholera years. The peasants welcome everyone, and on long winter evenings they listen to the stories of wanderers.

Such soil is good -

The soul of the Russian people...

O sower! come!..

Jonah, the venerable wanderer, told the story.

About two great sinners

He heard this story in Solovki from Father Pitirtma. There were twelve robbers, their chieftain was Kudeyar. Many robbers robbed and killed people

Suddenly the fierce robber

God awakened my conscience.

The villain's conscience overcame him,

He disbanded his gang,

He distributed property to the church,

I buried the knife under the willow tree.

He went on pilgrimage, but did not atone for his sins; he lived in the forest under an oak tree. God's messenger showed him the way to salvation - with the knife that killed people,

he must cut the oak:

“...A tree has just collapsed -

The chains of sin will fall.”

Pan Glukhovsky drove by and mocked the old man, saying:

“You have to live, old man, in my opinion:

How many slaves do I destroy?

I torment, torture and hang,

I wish I could see how I’m sleeping!”

The enraged hermit stuck his knife into Glukhovsky’s heart, fell

Pan, and the tree collapsed.

The tree collapsed rolled down

The monk is off the burden of sins!..

Let us pray to the Lord God:

Have mercy on us, dark slaves!

Chapter III

BOTH OLD AND NEW

Peasant sin

There was an “ammiral-widower”; the Empress rewarded him with eight thousand souls for his faithful service. Dying, the “ammiral” handed over to the elder Gleb a casket containing freedom for all eight thousand souls. But the heir seduced the headman, giving him his freedom. The will was burned. And until recently there were eight thousand

shower for serfs.

“So this is the peasant’s sin!

Truly a terrible sin!”

The poor have fallen again

To the bottom of a bottomless abyss,

They became quiet, they became humble,

They lay down on their stomachs;

They were lying down thought

And suddenly they started singing. Slowly,

Like a cloud is approaching,

The words flowed viscously.

Hungry

About a man's eternal hunger, work and lack of sleep. The peasants are convinced that “serfdom” is to blame for everything. It multiplies the sins of landowners and the misfortunes of slaves. Grisha said:

“I don’t need any silver,

No gold, but God willing,

So that my fellow countrymen

And every peasant

Life was free and fun

All over holy Rus'!”

They saw the sleepy Yegor Shutov and began to beat him, for which they themselves did not know. The “peace” ordered to beat, so they beat. An old soldier is riding on a cart. Stops and sings.

Soldatskaya

The light is sickening

There is no truth

Life is sickening

The pain is severe.

Klim sings along with him about the bitter life.

Chapter IV

GOOD TIME - GOOD SONGS

The “Great Feast” ended only in the morning. Some went home, and the wanderers went to bed right there on the shore. Returning home, Grisha and Savva sang:

Share of the people

His happiness

Light and freedom

First of all!

They lived poorer than a poor peasant; they did not even have cattle. At the seminary, Grisha was starving, only eating on Vakhlatchina. The sexton boasted about his sons, but did not think about what they ate. And I myself was always hungry. His wife was much more caring than him, which is why she died early. She always thought about salt and sang a song.

Salty

Son Grishenka does not want to eat unsalted food. The Lord advised to “salt” it with flour. The mother sprinkles flour and salts the food with her copious tears. Grisha is often at the seminary

remembered his mother and her song.

And soon in the boy's heart

With love to the poor mother

Love for all Vakhlatchina

Merged - and about fifteen years old

Gregory already knew for sure

What will live for happiness

Poor and dark.

Native corner.

Russia has two paths: one road is “hostility-war”, the other is an honest road. Only the “strong” and “loving” follow it.

To fight, to work.

Grisha Dobrosklonov

Fate had in store for him

The path is glorious big name

People's Defender,

Consumption and Siberia.

Grisha sings:

“In moments of despondency, O Motherland!

My thoughts fly forward.

You are still destined to suffer a lot,

But you won't die, I know.

She was both in slavery and under the Tatars:

“...You are also a slave in the family;

But the mother is already a free son.”

Grigory goes to the Volga and sees barge haulers.

Burlak

Grigory talks about the hard lot of barge haulers, and then his thoughts turn to all of Rus'.

Rus

You're miserable too

You are also abundant

You are mighty

You are also powerless

Mother Rus'!

People's power

Mighty force -

Conscience is calm,

The truth is alive!

You're miserable too

You are also abundant

You're downtrodden

You are omnipotent

If only our wanderers could be under their own roof,

If only they could know what was happening to Grisha.

“It’s not always possible to find a happy one between men, let’s touch the women!” - the wanderers decide. They are advised to go to the village of Klin and ask Korchagina Matryona Timofeevna, whom everyone nicknamed “the governor’s wife.” Wanderers come to the village:

Every hut has a support, Like a beggar with a crutch; And the straw from the roofs was fed to the cattle. The poor houses stand like skeletons.

At the gate, the wanderers meet a footman who explains that “the landowner is abroad, and the steward is dying.” Some guys are fishing in the river small fish, they complain that there used to be more fish. Peasants and courtyard workers take away what they can:

One servant was tormented at the door: he unscrewed the copper handles; the other was carrying some tiles...

A gray-haired servant offers to buy foreign books for the wanderers, and is angry that they refuse:

What do you need smart books for? Drinking signs for you Yes, the word “forbidden”, What is found on the pillars, Just read!

Wanderers hear a beautiful bass singing a song in an unknown language. It turns out that “the singer of Novo-Arkhangelskaya, the gentlemen lured him from Little Russia. They promised to take him to Italy, but they left.” Finally, the wanderers meet Matryona Timofeevna.

Matryona Timofeevna A dignified woman, broad and dense, about thirty-eight years old. Beautiful; gray hair, large, stern eyes, rich eyelashes, stern and dark.

The wanderers tell why they set off on their journey, Matryona Timofeevna replies that she has no time to talk about her life - she has to reap rye. The wanderers promise to help her remove the rye; Matryona Timofeevna “began to open her whole soul to our wanderers.”

Before marriage

I was lucky in the girls:

We had a good

Non-drinking family.

For father, for mother,

Like Christ in his bosom,

It was a lot of fun, but also a lot of work. Finally, “the betrothed was found”:

There's a stranger on the mountain!

Philip Korchagin - St. Petersburg resident,

Stove maker by skill.

The father cheated with the matchmakers and promised to give his daughter away. Matryona does not want to marry Philip, he persuades her and says that she will not offend her. In the end, Matryona Timofeevna agrees.

Chapter 2 Songs

Matryona Timofeevna ends up in someone else's house - with her mother-in-law and father-in-law. The narration is interrupted from time to time by songs about the hard lot of a girl who got married “to someone else.”

The family was huge, grumpy... I ended up in hell from my maiden holiday! My husband went to work

I advised to be silent, to be patient...

As ordered, so done:

I walked with anger in my heart,

And I didn’t say too much

A word to no one.

In winter Philippus came,

Brought a silk handkerchief

Yes, I went for a ride on a sled

On Catherine's day,

And it was as if there was no grief!..

The wanderers ask: “As if he didn’t beat you?” Matryona Timofeevna replies that only once, when her husband’s sister arrived and he asked to give her shoes, but Matryona Timofeevna hesitated. On the Annunciation, Philip again goes to work, and on Kazan, Matryona had a son, who was named Demushkoy. Life in the house of her husband’s parents has become even more difficult, but Matryona endures:

No matter what they tell me, I work, No matter how much they scold me, I remain silent.

Of all my husband’s family, Savely, the grandfather, the parent of my father-in-law, was the only one who felt sorry for me...

Matryona Timofeevna asks the wanderers whether to tell about grandfather Savely, they are ready to listen.

Chapter 3 Saveliy, the Holy Russian hero

With a huge gray mane,

Tea, twenty years uncut,

With a huge beard

Grandfather looked like a bear...

He's already hit it

According to fairy tales, a hundred years.

Grandfather lived in a special room,

Didn't like families

He didn’t let me into his corner;

And she was angry, barking,

His "branded, convict"

My own son was honoring. Savely will not get angry, he will go to his little room, read the calendar, cross himself, and suddenly say cheerfully: “Branded, but not a slave”...

One day Matryona asks Savely why he is called branded and a convict. Grandfather tells her his life. In his youth, the peasants of his village were also serfs, “but we didn’t know either landowners or German administrators then. We didn’t rule corvée, we didn’t pay taxes, but when it comes down to it, we’ll send it once in three years.” The places were remote, and no one could get there through the thickets and swamps. “Our landowner Shalash-nikov tried to approach us through the animal trails with his regiment - he was a military man - but turned his skis!” Then Shalashnikov sends an order to appear, but the peasants do not come. The police came (there was a drought) - “we paid her with honey and fish,” when they came another time, “with animal skins,” but the third time they gave nothing. They put on old bast shoes and holey army coats and went to Shalashnikov, who was stationed with a regiment in the provincial town. They came and said that there was no rent. Shalashnikov ordered them to be flogged. Shalashnikov flogged him severely; he had to “rip him open,” take out the money and bring half the cap of the “lobanchikov” (half-imperials). Shalashnikov immediately calmed down, even drank with the peasants. They set off on their way back, the two old men laughed that they were carrying hundred-ruble notes home, sewn into the lining.

Shalashnikov tore excellently, and received not so much great income.

Soon a notification arrives that Shalashnikov has been killed near Varna.

The heir came up with a solution: He sent a German to us. Through dense forests, through swampy swamps, a rogue came on foot!

And at first it was quiet: “Pay what you can.” - We can’t do anything!

“I’ll notify the master.”

Notify!.. - That’s the end of it.

The German, Christian Christian Vogel, meanwhile, gained confidence in the peasants, says: “If you can’t pay, then work.” They ask what the job is. He replies that it is advisable to dig around the swamp with ditches and cut down trees where desired. The peasants did as he asked, and they saw that it had become a clearing, a road. We realized it, but it was too late.

And then came hard labor

To the Korezh peasant -

Ruined to the bone!

And he tore... like Shalashnikov himself!

Yes, he was simple: he will attack

With all our military strength,

Just think: he will kill!

And put the money in - it will fall off,

Neither give nor take bloated

There is a tick in the dog's ear.

The German has a death grip:

Until he lets you go around the world,

Without moving away, he sucks! This life continued for eighteen years. The German built a factory and ordered a well to be dug. Nine people dug it, including Savely. After working until noon, we decided to rest. Then the German appeared and began to scold the peasants for idleness. The peasants pushed the German into a hole, Savely shouted “Give it up!”, and Vogel was buried alive. Next was “hard labor and whips beforehand; They didn’t tear it out - they anointed it, that’s some bad shit! Then... I escaped from hard labor... They caught me! They didn’t even pat me on the head.”

And life was not easy.

Twenty years of strict hard labor.

Twenty years of settlement.

I saved up some money

According to the Tsar's manifesto

I got back to my homeland again,

I built this little burner

And I’ve been living here for a long time.

Need to download an essay? Click and save - » Summary: “Who lives well in Rus'” - Part 3 Peasant woman. And the finished essay appeared in my bookmarks.

Rus' is a country in which even poverty has its charms. After all, the poor, who are slaves to the power of the landowners of that time, have time to reflect and see what the overweight landowner will never see.

Once upon a time, on the most ordinary road, where there was an intersection, men, seven in number, accidentally met together. These men are the most ordinary poor men whom fate itself brought together. The men just recently left serfdom, and are now temporarily in bondage. They, as it turned out, lived very close to each other. Their villages were adjacent - the villages of Zaplatova, Razutova, Dyryavina, Znobishina, as well as Gorelova, Neelova and Neurozhaika. The names of the villages are very peculiar, but to some extent, they reflect their owners.

Men are simple people and willing to talk. Precisely because, instead of simply continuing his long haul, they decide to talk. They argue about which of the rich and noble people lives better. A landowner, an official, a boyar or a merchant, or maybe even a sovereign father? Each of them has their own opinion, which they cherish, and do not want to agree with each other. The argument flares up more and more, but nevertheless, I want to eat. You cannot live without food, even if you feel bad and sad. When they argued, without noticing it, they walked, but in the wrong direction. Suddenly they noticed it, but it was too late. The men gave a distance of as much as thirty miles.

It was too late to return home, and therefore decided to continue the argument right there on the road, surrounded by wildlife. They quickly light a fire to keep warm, since it’s already evening. Vodka will help them. The argument, as always happens with ordinary men, develops into a brawl. The fight ends, but it doesn't give anyone any results. As always happens, the decision to be there is unexpected. One of the company of men sees a bird and catches it; the mother of the bird, in order to free her chick, tells them about the self-assembled tablecloth. After all, men on their road meet many people who, alas, do not have the happiness that men are looking for. But they don't despair of finding happy person.

Read the summary of Who Lives Well in Rus' by Nekrasov chapter by chapter

Part 1. Prologue

Seven temporary men met on the road. They began to argue about who lives funny, very freely in Rus'. While they were arguing, evening came, they went for vodka, lit a fire and began to argue again. The argument turned into a fight, while Pakhom caught a small chick. The mother bird flies in and asks to let her child go in exchange for a story about where to get a self-assembled tablecloth. The comrades decide to go wherever they look until they find out who lives well in Rus'.

Chapter 1. Pop

Men go on a hike. They pass through steppes, fields, abandoned houses, meeting both rich and poor. They asked the soldier they met about whether he was living happily, and the soldier responded by saying that he shaved with an awl and warmed himself with smoke. We passed by the priest. We decided to ask him how life was in Rus'. Pop claims that happiness does not lie in prosperity, luxury and tranquility. And he proves that he has no peace of mind, night and day they can call him to the dying man, that his son cannot learn to read and write, that he often sees sobs and tears at the coffins.

The priest claims that the landowners have scattered throughout their native land and because of this, now the priest has no wealth, as before. In the old days, he attended weddings of rich people and made money from it, but now everyone has left. He told me that he used to come to a peasant family to bury the breadwinner, but there was nothing to take from them. The priest went on his way.

Chapter 2. Country Fair

Wherever men go, they see stingy housing. A pilgrim washes his horse in the river, and the men ask him where the people from the village have gone. He replies that the fair is today in the village of Kuzminskaya. The men, coming to the fair, watch how honest people dance, walk, and drink. And they look at how one old man asks people for help. He promised to bring a gift to his granddaughter, but he doesn’t have two hryvnia.

Then a gentleman appears, as the young man in a red shirt is called, and buys shoes for the old man’s granddaughter. At the fair you can find everything your heart desires: books by Gogol, Belinsky, portraits, and so on. Travelers watch a performance with Petrushka, people give the actors drinks and a lot of money.

Chapter 3. Drunken night

Returning home after the holiday, people fell into ditches from drunkenness, women fought, complaining about life. Veretennikov, the one who bought the shoes for his granddaughter, walked along arguing that Russians are good and smart people, but drunkenness spoils everything, being a big disadvantage for people. The men told Veretennikov about Nagy Yakima. This guy lived in St. Petersburg and after a quarrel with a merchant he went to prison. One day he gave his son various pictures that hung on the walls, and he admired them more than his son. One day there was a fire, so instead of saving money, he started collecting pictures.

His money melted and then merchants gave only eleven rubles for it, and now the pictures hang on the walls in the new house. Yakim said that men don’t lie and said that sadness will come and people will be sad if they stop drinking. Then the young people began to hum the song, and they sang so well that one girl passing by couldn’t even hold back her tears. She complained that her husband was very jealous and she sat at home as if on a leash. After the story, the men began to remember their wives, realized that they missed them, and decided to quickly find out who was living well in Rus'.

Chapter 4. Happy

Travelers, passing by an idle crowd, look for happy people in it, promising to pour them a drink. The clerk came to them first, knowing that happiness does not lie in luxury and wealth, but in faith in God. He talked about what he believes and that makes him happy. Next, the old woman talks about her happiness; the turnip in her garden has grown huge and appetizing. In response, she hears ridicule and advice to go home. Afterwards the soldier tells the story that after twenty battles he remained alive, that he survived hunger and did not die, that this made him happy. He gets a glass of vodka and leaves. The stonecutter wields a large hammer and has immense strength.

In response, the thin man ridicules him, advising him not to boast about his strength, otherwise God will take away his strength. The contractor boasts that he carried objects weighing fourteen pounds with ease to the second floor, but lately lost his strength and was about to die in his hometown. A nobleman came to them and told them that he lived with his mistress, ate very well with them, drank drinks from other people's glasses and developed a strange illness. He was wrong in his diagnosis several times, but in the end it turned out that it was gout. The wanderers kick him out so that he does not drink wine with them. Then the Belarusian said that happiness is in bread. Beggars see happiness in giving a lot. The vodka is running out, but they haven’t found a truly happy person, they are advised to look for happiness from Ermila Girin, who runs the mill. Yermil is awarded to sell it, wins the auction, but has no money.

He went to ask the people in the square for a loan, collected money, and the mill became his property. The next day he returned to everyone good people who helped him in difficult times, they get their money. The travelers were amazed that the people believed Ermila’s words and helped. Good people said that Ermila was the colonel’s clerk. He worked honestly, but he was driven away. When the colonel died and the time came to choose a mayor, everyone unanimously chose Yermil. Someone said that Ermila did not correctly judge the son of the peasant woman Nenila Vlasyevna.

Ermila was very sad that he could let the peasant woman down. He ordered that the people judge him, young man awarded a fine. He quit his job and rented a mill and established his own order on it. They advised travelers to go to Girin, but the people said that he was in prison. And then everything is interrupted because a footman is whipped on the side of the road for theft. The wanderers asked for the continuation of the story, and in response they heard a promise to continue at the next meeting.

Chapter 5. Landowner

The wanderers meet a landowner who mistakes them for thieves and even threatens them with a pistol. Obolt Obolduev, having understood the people, started a story about the antiquity of his family, that while serving the sovereign he had a salary of two rubles. He remembers feasts rich in various foods, servants, and he had a whole regiment. Regrets the lost unlimited power. The landowner told how kind he was, how people prayed in his house, how spiritual purity was created in his house. And now their gardens have been cut down, their houses have been dismantled brick by brick, the forest has been plundered, not a trace remains of their former life. The landowner complains that he is not created for such a life; after living in the village for forty years, he will not be able to distinguish barley from rye, but they demand that he work. The landowner is crying, the people sympathize with him.

Part 2. The Last One

The wanderers, walking past the hayfield, decide to mow a little, they are bored with their work. The gray-haired man Vlas drives the women out of the fields and asks them not to disturb the landowner. Landowners catch fish in boats in the river. We moored and went around the hayfield. The wanderers began to ask the man about the landowner. It turned out that the sons, in collusion with the people, were deliberately indulging the master so that he would not deprive them of their inheritance. The sons beg everyone to play along with them. One man, Ipat, serves without playing along, for the salvation that the master gave him. Over time, everyone gets used to deception and lives like that. Only the man Agap Petrov did not want to play these games. Utyatina grabbed the second blow, but again he woke up and ordered Agap to be publicly flogged. The sons put the wine in the stable and asked them to shout loudly so that the prince could hear them up to the porch. But soon Agap died, they say from the prince’s wine. People stand in front of the porch and play a comedy; one rich man can’t stand it and laughs loudly. A peasant woman saves the situation and falls at the prince’s feet, claiming that it was her stupid little son who laughed. As soon as Utyatin died, all the people breathed freely.

Part 3. Peasant woman

They send to the neighboring village to Matryona Timofeevna to ask about happiness. There is hunger and poverty in the village. Someone caught a small fish in the river and talks about how once upon a time a larger fish was caught.

Theft is rampant, people are trying to steal something. Travelers find Matryona Timofeevna. She insists that she doesn’t have time to rant, she needs to remove the rye. The wanderers help her, and while working, Timofeevna begins to willingly talk about her life.

Chapter 1. Before marriage

In her youth, the girl had a strong family. She lived in her parents' house without knowing any troubles; she had enough time to have fun and work. One day Philip Korchagin appeared, and the father promised to give his daughter as a wife. Matryona resisted for a long time, but eventually agreed.

Chapter 2. Songs

Next, the story is about life in the house of the father-in-law and mother-in-law, which is interrupted by sad songs. They beat her once for being slow. Her husband leaves for work, and she gives birth to a child. She calls him Demushka. Her husband's parents began to scold her often, but she endured everything. Only the father-in-law, old man Savely, felt sorry for his daughter-in-law.

Chapter 3. Savely, the Holy Russian hero

He lived in an upper room, did not like his family and did not allow them into his house. He told Matryona about his life. In his youth he was a Jew in a serf family. The village was remote, you had to get there through thickets and swamps. The landowner in the village was Shalashnikov, but he could not get to the village, and the peasants did not even go to him when called. The rent was not paid; the police were given fish and honey as tribute. They went to the master and complained that there was no rent. Having threatened with flogging, the landowner still received his tribute. After some time, a notification comes that Shalashnikov has been killed.

The rogue came instead of the landowner. He ordered trees to be cut down if there was no money. When the workers came to their senses, they realized that they had cut a road to the village. The German robbed them to the last penny. Vogel built a factory and ordered a ditch to be dug. The peasants sat down to rest at lunch, the German went to scold them for idleness. They pushed him into a ditch and buried him alive. He ended up in hard labor and escaped from there twenty years later. During hard labor he saved up money, built a hut and now lives there.

Chapter 4. Demushka

The daughter-in-law scolded the girl for not working enough. She began to leave her son to his grandfather. Grandfather ran to the field and told him that he had overlooked and fed Demushka to the pigs. The mother’s grief was not enough, but the police began to come often, they suspected that she had killed the child on purpose. The child was buried in closed coffin, she mourned him for a long time. And Savely kept reassuring her.

Chapter 5. Patrimony

As soon as you die, the work stops. The father-in-law decided to teach a lesson and beat the bride. She began to beg to kill her, and her father took pity. The mother mourned at her son’s grave all day and night. In winter, my husband returned. Grandfather left from grief, first into the forest, then into the monastery. After that, Matryona gave birth every year. And again a series of troubles began. Timofeevna's parents died. Grandfather returned from the monastery, asked his mother for forgiveness, and said that he had prayed for Demushka. But he never lived long; he died very hard. Before his death, he spoke about three paths of life for women and two paths for men. Four years later, a praying mantis comes to the village.

She kept talking about some beliefs and advised not to feed breast milk children by fast days. Timofeevna did not listen, then she regretted it, she says God punished her. When her child, Fedot, was eight years old, he began to herd sheep. And somehow they came to complain about him. They say that he fed the sheep to the she-wolf. Mother began to question Fedot. The child said that before he could blink an eye, a she-wolf appeared out of nowhere and grabbed the sheep. He ran after him and caught up, but the sheep was dead. The she-wolf howled, it was clear that she had cubs somewhere in the hole. He took pity on her and gave her the dead sheep. They tried to flog Fetod, but his mother took all the punishment upon herself.

Chapter 6. Difficult year

Matryona Timofeevna said that it was not easy for the she-wolf to see her son like that. He believes that this was a harbinger of famine. My mother-in-law spread all the gossip around the village about Matryona. She said that her daughter-in-law cawed out hunger because she knew how to do such things. She said that her husband was protecting her. And if it weren’t for her son, she would have been beaten to death with stakes long ago as before for this.

After the hunger strike, they began to take children from villages to serve. They took her husband's brother first, she was calm that her husband would be with her in difficult times. But my husband was also taken away from the queue. Life becomes unbearable, her mother-in-law and father-in-law begin to mock her even more.

Picture or drawing Who lives well in Rus'

Part two

The last one. Chapter (I; II; III)

The men wander on, not giving up on their desire to find someone happy. They go out to the bank of the Volga and see a hay meadow in front of them. They notice three boats in which the master’s family sat down. They look at them and are surprised: serfdom has already been abolished, but with them everything is as if there was no reform.

The gray-haired old man Utyatin, having learned about the will of the peasants, promised to deprive his sons of their money, and to prevent this from happening, they came up with a simple plan: they begged the peasants to pass themselves off as serfs, and in return, after the death of the master, they would give them the best meadows. Having learned that people remained in the power of Utyatin, he immediately became kinder and perked up. Everyone accepted their role, but Agap Petrov was unable to hide his dissatisfaction and complained to the landowner, for which he was sentenced to flogging. The peasants played a scene with him, but after such humiliation, Agap got drunk and died.

So the master threw a feast, where he praised serfdom, after which the hero lay down in the boat and gave up the ghost. The people rejoice that the prince died, the peasants began to wait for the fulfillment of their promises, but no one gave the meadows.

Part three

Peasant Woman: Prologue and Chapters 1-8

Continuing the search for a person who knew human happiness, 7 men decided to look for one among women. They are sent to a woman named Korchagina Matryona Timofeevna. From her the peasants learn the very sad and difficult fate of the heroine. From the story, the men understand that only in her father’s house she was able to know happiness, and when she got married, she doomed herself to a difficult life, because her new relatives did not like her. True love feelings did not reign for long between Matryona and her lover: he left to work, and left his wife to take care of the household. Matryona does not know fatigue, she works day and night to support her family and her son Demushka, a ray of hope and joy in her difficult female lot. Del. Savely is watching over him - the only person who new family supported her. His fate is no easier: once he and his comrades killed the manager because he ruined their village. For murder, the man went to hard labor, from where he emerged sick and weak. His relatives reproached him for this.

One day a misfortune befalls him: the boy is eaten by pigs. Grandfather neglected to look after him. A real blow for a woman! She cannot forget her son, although other children have already appeared. One day she even accepts a spanking, helping her son out. He gave up the sheep to a hungry wolf out of pity, and they wanted to publicly flog him, an eight-year-old boy.

And here's a new problem! The husband is recruited, and there is no one to intercede. Then Matryona goes to the official to ask for her husband, because he is the only breadwinner for the family. She finds his wife, and the lady helps the peasant woman - the family is left alone. For this incident, the heroine was nicknamed lucky.

Now Matryona Timofeevna, as in former times, sacrifices herself for the sake of her growing children. Life is not easy for the “lucky one”. The constant struggle for her family, husband and children “shattered” Matryona Korchagina. As a result, she exclaims: “It’s not a matter of looking for a happy woman among women!”

Feast for the whole world

The action takes place on the banks of the Volga, near the village of Vakhlachina. A great feast is organized here, where 7 men stop, looking for a happy man.

There are a wide variety of heroes who narrate their destinies here. Everyone has a heavy burden of life events behind them, which, like an unhealed scar, makes itself felt. They are given to reasoning about what life is, what the path of an ordinary peasant is and how the people live.

Epilogue. Grisha Dobrosklonov

A significant hero of this fragment is Grisha Dobrosklonov. The reader will also learn its rich history from the chapter “A feast for the whole world.” The writer concludes the chapter under consideration with the hero’s reasoning about the fate of the people, about what will happen to them next. And all these thoughts began to pour out into songs about the people and Rus', the support of which he saw in the unity of people, because it contains great power, which is not afraid of the greatest adversity.

This is a happy person, because he lives for the sake of a high and pure goal - to alleviate the difficult lot of his compatriots. Although fate is preparing for him exile, exile, consumption, he is still ready to accept this burden for the sake of fulfilling his dream - the prosperity of his homeland.

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Content:

Nekrasov’s poem “Who Lives Well in Rus'” tells about the journey of seven peasants across Russia in search of a happy person. The work was written in the late 60s to mid 70s. XIX century, after the reforms of Alexander II and the abolition of serfdom. It tells about a post-reform society in which not only many old vices have not disappeared, but many new ones have appeared. According to the plan of Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov, the wanderers were supposed to reach St. Petersburg at the end of the journey, but due to the illness and imminent death of the author, the poem remained unfinished.
The work “Who Lives Well in Rus'” is written in blank verse and stylized as Russian folk tales.

Main characters

Roman, Demyan, Luka, the Gubin Brothers Ivan and Mitrodor, Pakhom, Prov - seven peasants who went to look for a happy man.

Other characters

Yermil Girin is the first “candidate” for the title of lucky man, an honest mayor, very respected by the peasants.

Matryona Korchagina is a peasant woman who is known in her village as a “lucky woman”.

Savely is the grandfather of Matryona Korchagina’s husband. A hundred year old man.

Prince Utyatin is an old landowner, a tyrant, to whom his family, in agreement with the peasants, does not talk about the abolition of serfdom.

Vlas is a peasant, mayor of a village that once belonged to Utyatin.

Grisha Dobrosklonov is a seminarian, the son of a clerk, who dreams of the liberation of the Russian people; the prototype was the revolutionary democrat N. Dobrolyubov.

Part 1 Prologue

Seven men converge on the “pillar path”: Roman, Demyan, Luka, the Gubin brothers, old man Pakhom and Prov. The district from which they come is called by the author Terpigorev, and the “adjacent villages” from which the men come are called Zaplatovo, Dyryaevo, Razutovo, Znobishino, Gorelovo, Neelovo and Neurozhaiko, thus the poem uses the artistic device of “speaking” names .

The men got together and argued:
Who has fun?
Free in Rus'?

Each of them insists on his own. One shouts that life is most free for the landowner, another that for the official, the third for the priest, “the fat-bellied merchant,” “the noble boyar, the sovereign’s minister,” or the tsar.
From the outside it seems as if the men found a treasure on the road and are now dividing it among themselves. The men have already forgotten what business they left the house for, and go to God knows where until night falls. Only here do the men stop and, “blaming the trouble on the devil,” sit down to rest and continue the argument. Soon it comes to a fight.

Roman is pushing Pakhomushka,
Demyan pushes Luka.

The fight alarmed the whole forest, an echo woke up, animals and birds became worried, a cow mooed, a cuckoo croaked, jackdaws squeaked, the fox, who had been eavesdropping on the men, decided to run away.

And then there’s the warbler
Tiny chick with fright
Fell from the nest.

When the fight is over, the men pay attention to this chick and catch it. It’s easier for a bird than for a man, says Pakhom. If he had wings, he would fly all over Rus' to find out who lives best in it. “We wouldn’t even need wings,” the others add, they would just have some bread and “a bucket of vodka,” as well as cucumbers, kvass and tea. Then they would measure all of “Mother Rus' with their feet.”

While the men are interpreting this, a warbler flies up to them and asks them to let her chick go free. For him she will give a royal ransom: everything the men want.

The men agree, and the warbler shows them a place in the forest where a box with a self-assembled tablecloth is buried. Then she enchants their clothes so that they do not wear out, so that their bast shoes do not break, their foot wraps do not rot, and louses do not breed on their bodies, and flies away “with her birth chick.” In parting, the chiffchaff warns the peasant: they can ask for as much food from the self-assembled tablecloth as they want, but you can’t ask for more than a bucket of vodka a day:

And once and twice - it will come true
At your request,
And the third time there will be trouble!

The peasants rush into the forest, where they actually find a self-assembled tablecloth. Delighted, they throw a feast and make a vow: not to return home until they find out for sure “who lives happily and at ease in Rus'?”

This is how their journey begins.

Chapter 1. Pop

A wide path lined with birch trees stretches far away. On it, the men come across mostly “small people” - peasants, artisans, beggars, soldiers. Travelers don’t even ask them anything: what kind of happiness is there? Towards evening, the men meet the priest. The men block his path and bow low. In response to the priest’s silent question: what do they want?, Luka talks about the dispute that started and asks: “Is the priest’s life sweet?”

The priest thinks for a long time, and then answers that since it is a sin to grumble against God, he will simply describe his life to the men, and they will figure out for themselves whether it is good.

Happiness, according to the priest, lies in three things: “peace, wealth, honor.” The priest knows no peace: his rank is earned by hard work, and then an equally difficult service begins; the cries of orphans, the cries of widows and the groans of the dying contribute little to peace of mind.

The situation is no better with honor: the priest serves as an object for the witticisms of the common people, obscene tales, anecdotes and fables are written about him, which do not spare not only himself, but also his wife and children.

The last thing that remains is wealth, but even here everything has changed long ago. Yes, there were times when the nobles honored the priest, played magnificent weddings and came to their estates to die - that was the job of the priests, but now “the landowners have scattered across distant foreign lands.” So it turns out that the priest is content with rare copper nickels:

The peasant himself needs
And I would be glad to give it, but there’s nothing...

Having finished his speech, the priest leaves, and the disputants attack Luke with reproaches. They unanimously accuse him of stupidity, of the fact that it was only at first glance that the priest’s housing seemed comfortable to him, but he could not figure it out deeper.

What did you take? stubborn head!

The men would probably have beaten Luka, but then, to his happiness, at the bend of the road, “the priest’s stern face” appears once again...

Chapter 2. Rural fair

The men continue their journey, and their road goes through empty villages. Finally they meet the rider and ask him where the villagers have gone.

We went to the village of Kuzminskoye,
Today there is a fair...

Then the wanderers decide to also go to the fair - what if it is there that the one “who lives happily” is hiding?

Kuzminskoye is a rich, albeit dirty village. It has two churches, a school, a dirty hotel and even a paramedic. That’s why the fair is rich, and most of all there are taverns, “eleven taverns,” and they don’t have time to pour a drink for everyone:

Oh Orthodox thirst,
How great are you!

There are a lot of drunk people around. A man scolds a broken ax, and Vavil’s grandfather, who promised to bring shoes for his granddaughter, but drank away all the money, is sad next to him. The people feel sorry for him, but no one can help him - they themselves have no money. Fortunately, a “master” happens, Pavlusha Veretennikov, and he buys shoes for Vavila’s granddaughter.

Ofeni are also sold at the fair, but the most low-quality books, as well as thicker portraits of generals, are in demand. And no one knows whether the time will come when a man:

Belinsky and Gogol
Will it come from the market?

By evening everyone gets so drunk that even the church with its bell tower seems to be shaking, and the men leave the village.

Chapter 3. Drunken night

It's a quiet night. The men walk along the “hundred-voice” road and hear snatches of other people’s conversations. They talk about officials, about bribes: “And we give fifty dollars to the clerk: We have made a request,” women’s songs are heard asking them to “love.” One drunk guy buries his clothes in the ground, assuring everyone that he is “burying his mother.” At the road sign, the wanderers again meet Pavel Veretennikov. He talks with peasants, writes down their songs and sayings. Having written down enough, Veretennikov blames the peasants for drinking a lot - “it’s a shame to see!” They object to him: the peasant drinks mainly out of grief, and it is a sin to condemn or envy him.

The objector's name is Yakim Goly. Pavlusha also writes down his story in a book. Even in his youth, Yakim bought popular prints for his son and he loved looking at them just as much as the child. When there was a fire in the hut, the first thing he did was rush to tear pictures from the walls, and so all his savings, thirty-five rubles, were burned. Now he gets 11 rubles for a melted lump.

Having heard enough stories, the wanderers sit down to refresh themselves, then one of them, Roman, remains at the guard’s bucket of vodka, and the rest again mix with the crowd in search of the happy one.

Chapter 4. Happy

Wanderers walk in the crowd and call for the happy one to appear. If such a one appears and tells them about his happiness, then he will be treated to vodka.

Sober people laugh at such speeches, but a considerable queue of drunk people forms. The sexton comes first. His happiness, in his words, is “in complacency” and in the “kosushechka” that the men pour out. The sexton is driven away, and an old woman appears who, on a small ridge, “up to a thousand turnips were born.” The next to try his luck is a soldier with medals, “he’s barely alive, but he wants a drink.” His happiness is that no matter how much he was tortured in the service, he still remained alive. There also come a stonecutter with a huge hammer, a peasant who overstrained himself in the service but still made it home barely alive, a yard man with a “noble” disease - gout. The latter boasts that for forty years he stood at the table of His Serene Highness, licking plates and finishing glasses of foreign wine. The men drive him away too, because they have simple wine, “not for your lips!”

The queue for travelers is not getting smaller. The Belarusian peasant is happy that here he eats to his fill rye bread, because in their homeland they baked bread only with chaff, and this caused terrible cramps in the stomach. A man with a folded cheekbone, a hunter, is happy that he survived the fight with the bear, while the rest of his comrades were killed by the bears. Even beggars come: they are happy that there is alms to feed them.

Finally, the bucket is empty, and the wanderers realize that they will not find happiness this way.

Hey, man's happiness!
Leaky, with patches,
Humpbacked with calluses,
Go home!

Here one of the people who approached them advises them to “ask Ermila Girin,” because if he doesn’t turn out to be happy, then there’s nothing to look for. Ermila is a simple man who has earned the great love of the people. Wanderers are told the following story: once upon a time Ermila had a mill, but for debts...
they decided to sell it. The bidding began; the merchant Altynnikov really wanted to buy the mill. Yermila was able to beat his price, but the problem was that he didn’t have the money with him to make a deposit. Then he asked for an hour's delay and ran to the market square to ask the people for money.

And a miracle happened: Yermil received the money. Very soon he had the thousand he needed to buy out the mill. And a week later there was an even more wonderful sight on the square: Yermil was “calculating the people”, he distributed the money to everyone and honestly. There was only one extra ruble left, and Yermil kept asking until sunset whose it was.

The wanderers are perplexed: by what witchcraft did Yermil gain such trust from the people. They are told that this is not witchcraft, but the truth. Girin served as a clerk in an office and never took a penny from anyone, but helped with advice. The old prince soon died, and the new one ordered the peasants to elect a burgomaster. Unanimously, “six thousand souls, the whole estate,” Yermila shouted - although young, he loves the truth!

Only once did Yermil “betray his soul” when he did not recruit his younger brother, Mitriya, replacing him with the son of Nenila Vlasyevna. But after this act, Yermil’s conscience tormented him so much that he soon tried to hang himself. Mitri was handed over as a recruit, and Nenila’s son was returned to her. Yermil, for a long time, was not himself, “he resigned from his position,” but instead rented a mill and became “more loved by the people than before.”

But here the priest intervenes in the conversation: all this is true, but going to Yermil Girin is useless. He is sitting in prison. The priest begins to tell how it happened - the village of Stolbnyaki rebelled and the authorities decided to call Yermil - his people will listen.

The story is interrupted by shouts: they caught the thief and flogged him. The thief turns out to be the same footman with the “noble illness”, and after the flogging he runs away as if he had completely forgotten about his illness.
Meanwhile, the priest says goodbye, promising to finish telling the story the next time they meet.

Chapter 5. Landowner

On their further journey, the men meet the landowner Gavrila Afanasich Obolt-Obolduev. The landowner is frightened at first, suspecting them to be robbers, but, having figured out what the matter is, he laughs and begins to tell his story. He traces his noble family back to the Tatar Oboldui, who was skinned by a bear for the amusement of the empress. She gave the Tatar cloth for this. Such were the noble ancestors of the landowner...

The law is my desire!
The fist is my police!

However, not all strictness; the landowner admits that he “attracted hearts more with affection”! All the servants loved him, gave him gifts, and he was like a father to them. But everything changed: the peasants and land were taken away from the landowner. The sound of an ax can be heard from the forests, everyone is being destroyed, drinking houses are springing up in place of estates, because now no one needs a letter at all. And they shout to the landowners:

Wake up, sleepy landowner!
Get up! - study! work!..

But how can a landowner, who has been accustomed to something completely different since childhood, work? They didn’t learn anything, and “thought they’d live like this forever,” but it turned out differently.
The landowner began to cry, and the good-natured peasants almost cried with him, thinking:

The great chain has broken,
Torn and splintered:
One way for the master,
Others don't care!..

Part 2 Last One

The next day, the men go to the banks of the Volga, to a huge hay meadow. They had barely started talking with the locals when music began and three boats moored to the shore. They are a noble family: two gentlemen with their wives, little barchat, servants and a gray-haired old gentleman. The old man inspects the mowing, and everyone bows to him almost to the ground. In one place he stops and orders the dry haystack to be swept away: the hay is still damp. The absurd order is immediately carried out.

The wanderers marvel:
Grandfather!
What a wonderful old man?

It turns out that the old man - Prince Utyatin - upon learning about the abolition of serfdom, “beguiled” and died with a stroke. His sons were told that they had betrayed the landowner's ideals, were unable to defend them, and if so, they would be left without an inheritance. The sons got scared and persuaded the peasants to fool the landowner a little, with the idea that after his death they would give the village flood meadows. The old man was told that the tsar ordered the serfs to be returned to the landowners, the prince was delighted and stood up. So this comedy continues to this day. Some peasants are even happy about this, for example, the courtyard Ipat:

Ipat said: “Have fun!
And I am the Utyatin princes
Serf - and that’s the whole story!”

But Agap Petrov cannot come to terms with the fact that even in freedom someone will push him around. One day he told the master everything directly, and he had a stroke. When he woke up, he ordered Agap to be flogged, and the peasants, so as not to reveal the deception, took him to the stable, where they placed a bottle of wine in front of him: drink and shout louder! Agap died that same night: it was hard for him to bow down...
The wanderers attend the feast of the Last One, where he gives a speech about the benefits of serfdom, and then lies down in a boat and falls asleep in eternal sleep while listening to songs. The village of Vakhlaki sighs with sincere relief, but no one will give them the meadows - the trial continues to this day.

Part 3 Peasant woman

"Not everything is between men
Find the happy one
Let’s feel the women!”
With these words it’s strange

Iki go to Korchagina Matryona Timofeevna, the governor, beautiful woman 38 years old, who, however, already calls herself an old woman. She talks about her life. Then I was only happy, as I grew up in parents' house. But girlhood quickly flew by, and now Matryona is already being wooed. Her betrothed is Philip, handsome, ruddy and strong. He loves his wife, but soon goes to work, and leaves her with his large, but alien to Matryona, family.

Matryona works for her older sister-in-law, her strict mother-in-law, and her father-in-law. She had no joy in her life until her eldest son, Demushka, was born.

In the whole family, only the old grandfather Savely, the “hero of the Holy Russian”, who is living out his life after twenty years of hard labor, feels sorry for Matryona. He ended up in hard labor for the murder of a German manager who did not give the men a single free minute. Savely told Matryona a lot about his life, about “Russian heroism.”

The mother-in-law forbids Matryona to take Demushka into the field: she doesn’t work with him much. The grandfather looks after the child, but one day he falls asleep and the child is eaten by pigs. After some time, Matryona meets Savely at the grave of Demushka, who has gone to repentance at the Sand Monastery. She forgives him and takes him home, where the old man soon dies.

Matryona had other children, but she could not forget Demushka. One of them, the shepherdess Fedot, once wanted to be whipped for a sheep carried away by a wolf, but Matryona took the punishment upon herself. When she was pregnant with Liodorushka, she had to go to the city and ask for the return of her husband, who had been taken into the army. Matryona gave birth right in the waiting room, and the governor’s wife, Elena Alexandrovna, for whom the whole family is now praying, helped her. Since then, Matryona “has been glorified as a lucky woman and nicknamed the governor’s wife.” But what kind of happiness is that?

This is what Matryonushka says to the wanderers and adds: they will never find a happy woman among women, the keys to female happiness lost, and even God does not know where to find them.

Part 4 Feast for the whole world

There is a feast in the village of Vakhlachina. Everyone gathered here: the wanderers, Klim Yakovlich, and Vlas the elder. Among those feasting are two seminarians, Savvushka and Grisha, kind simple guys. They, at the request of the people, sing a “funny” song, then it’s their turn for different stories. There is a story about an “exemplary slave - Yakov the faithful,” who followed the master all his life, fulfilled all his whims and rejoiced even in the master’s beatings. Only when the master gave his nephew as a soldier did Yakov start drinking, but soon returned to the master. And yet Yakov did not forgive him, and was able to take revenge on Polivanov: he took him, with his legs swollen, into the forest, and there he hanged himself on a pine tree above the master.

A dispute ensues about who is the most sinful. God's wanderer Jonah tells the story of “two sinners,” about the robber Kudeyar. The Lord awakened his conscience and imposed a penance on him: cut down a huge oak tree in the forest, then his sins will be forgiven. But the oak fell only when Kudeyar sprinkled it with the blood of the cruel Pan Glukhovsky. Ignatius Prokhorov objects to Jonah: the peasant’s sin is still greater, and tells a story about the headman. He hid the last will of his master, who decided to set his peasants free before his death. But the headman, seduced by money, tore up his freedom.

The crowd is depressed. Songs are sung: “Hungry”, “Soldier’s”. But the time will come in Rus' for good songs. This is confirmed by two seminarian brothers, Savva and Grisha. Seminarian Grisha, the son of a sexton, has known for sure since the age of fifteen that he wants to devote his life to the people’s happiness. Love for his mother merges in his heart with love for all Vakhlachin. Grisha walks along his land and sings a song about Rus':

You're miserable too
You are also abundant
You are mighty
You are also powerless
Mother Rus'!

And his plans will not be lost: fate is preparing for Grisha “a glorious path, a great name for the people’s intercessor, consumption and Siberia.” In the meantime, Grisha sings, and it’s a pity that the wanderers can’t hear him, because then they would understand that they have already found a happy person and could return home.

Conclusion

This ends the unfinished chapters of the poem by Nekrasov. However, even from the surviving parts, the reader is presented with a large-scale picture of post-reform Rus', which with pain is learning to live in a new way. The range of problems raised by the author in the poem is very wide: the problems of widespread drunkenness, the problems of women ruining the Russian man, the ineradicable slave psychology and main problem people's happiness. Most of these problems, unfortunately, to one degree or another remain relevant today, which is why the work is very popular, and a number of quotes from it have entered everyday speech. The compositional method of the main characters' journey brings the poem closer to an adventure novel, making it easy to read and with great interest.

A brief retelling of “Who Lives Well in Rus'” conveys only the most basic content of the poem; for a more accurate idea of the work, we recommend that you read full version“Who lives well in Rus'.”

Read the summary of Who Lives Well in Rus' by Nekrasov chapter by chapter

Part 1. Prologue

Chapter 1. Pop

Chapter 2. Country Fair

Chapter 3. Drunken night

Chapter 4. Happy

Chapter 5. Landowner

Part 2. The Last One

Part 3. Peasant woman

Chapter 1. Before marriage

Chapter 2. Songs

Chapter 3. Savely, the Holy Russian hero

Chapter 4. Demushka

Chapter 5. Patrimony

Chapter 6. Difficult year

Picture or drawing Who lives well in Rus'

Other retellings for the reader's diary

Prologue

Chapter I. Pop

Chapter II. Country fair

Chapter III. drunken night

Chapter IV. Happy

Chapter V. Landowner

Part two

The last one. Chapter (I; II; III)

Part three

Peasant Woman: Prologue and Chapters 1-8

Feast for the whole world

Epilogue. Grisha Dobrosklonov

Main characters

Other characters

Part 1

Prologue

Chapter 1. Pop

Chapter 2. Rural fair

Chapter 3. Drunken night

Chapter 4. Happy

Chapter 5. Landowner

Part 2

Last One

Part 3

Peasant woman

Part 4

Feast for the whole world

Conclusion