If you adhere to proper nutrition, then avocados are probably in ...
A young man of twenty-six years old is a petty official who has been living for eight years in St. Petersburg in the 1840s, in one of the tenement houses along the Catherine Canal, in a room with cobwebs and smoky walls. After the service, his favorite pastime is walking around the city. He notices passers-by and at home, some of them become his "friends". However, among the people he has almost no acquaintances. He is poor and lonely. With sadness, he watches how the inhabitants of St. Petersburg are going to the dacha. He has nowhere to go. Leaving the city, he enjoys the northern spring nature, which looks like a "stunted and sick" girl, for a moment becoming "wonderfully beautiful."
Returning home at ten o'clock in the evening, the hero sees a female figure at the grate of the canal and hears sobbing. Sympathy prompts him to get acquainted, but the girl timidly runs away. A drunk tries to stick to her, and only the "knot stick", which ended up in the hero's hand, saves the pretty stranger. They talk to each other. The young man admits that before he knew only “housewives”, he never spoke with “women”, and therefore he is very timid. This calms the companion. She listens to the story about the “romances” that the guide created in dreams, about falling in love with ideal fictional images, about the hope of someday meeting in reality a girl worthy of love. But here she is almost at home and wants to say goodbye. The dreamer begs for a new meeting. The girl "needs to be here for herself", and she does not mind the presence of a new acquaintance tomorrow at the same hour in the same place. Her condition is "friendship", "but you can't fall in love." Like the Dreamer, she needs someone to trust, someone to ask for advice.
In the second meeting, they decide to listen to each other's "stories". The hero starts. It turns out that he is a “type”: in “strange corners of St. ". They are afraid of the company of living people, as they spend long hours among "magic ghosts", in "enthusiastic dreams", in imaginary "adventures". “You speak as if you are reading a book,” Nastenka guesses the source of the interlocutor's plots and images: the works of Hoffmann, Merimee, V. Scott, Pushkin. After intoxicating, "voluptuous" dreams, it hurts to wake up in "loneliness", in your "musty, unnecessary life." The girl pities her friend, and he himself understands that "such a life is a crime and a sin." After "fantastic nights" he already "finds minutes of sobering up, which are terrible." "Dreams survive", the soul wants " real life". Nastenka promises the Dreamer that now they will be together. And here is her confession. She is an orphan. Lives with an old blind grandmother in a small house of her own. Until the age of fifteen she studied with a teacher, and two recent years sits “pinned” to the dress of her grandmother, who otherwise cannot keep track of her. A year ago, they had a tenant, a young man of "pleasant appearance." He gave his young mistress books by V. Scott, Pushkin and other authors. I invited them to the theater with my grandmother. I especially remember the opera "The Barber of Seville". When he announced that he was leaving, the poor recluse decided on a desperate act: she packed her things into a bundle, came into the tenant's room, sat down and "cried in three streams." Fortunately, he understood everything, and most importantly, he managed to fall in love with Nastenka before that. But he was poor and without a "decent place", and therefore could not immediately marry. They agreed that exactly one year later, returning from Moscow, where he hoped to "arrange his affairs", the young man would be waiting for his bride on a bench near the canal at ten o'clock in the evening. A year has passed. He has been in Petersburg for three days already. He is not in the appointed place ... Now the hero understands the reason for the girl's tears on the evening of acquaintance. Trying to help, he volunteers to deliver her letter to the groom, which he does the next day.
Because of the rain, the third meeting of the heroes takes place only through the night. Nastenka is afraid that the groom will not come again, and cannot hide her excitement from her friend. She feverishly dreams of the future. The hero is sad, because he himself loves the girl. And yet, the Dreamer has the selflessness to console and reassure Nastenka, who has fallen in spirit. Touched, the girl compares the groom with a new friend: “Why is he not you? .. He is worse than you, even though I love him more than you.” And he continues to dream: “Why are we all not like brothers and brothers? Why the most best person always as if something is hiding from the other and is silent from him? Everyone looks like he is more severe than he really is ... "Gratefully accepting the Dreamer's sacrifice, Nastenka also takes care of him:" you are recovering "," you will love ... "" God bless you with her !" In addition, now with the hero forever and her friendship.
And finally, the fourth night. The girl finally felt abandoned “inhumanly” and “cruelly”. The dreamer again offers help: go to the offender and make him "respect" Nastenka's feelings. However, pride awakens in her: she no longer loves the deceiver and will try to forget him. The "barbaric" act of the tenant sets off moral beauty sitting next to a friend: “wouldn’t you do that? would you not throw the one who would have come to you herself into the eyes of shameless mockery of her weak, stupid heart? The dreamer no longer has the right to hide the truth that the girl has already guessed: “I love you, Nastenka!” He does not want to "torment" her with his "selfishness" in a bitter moment, but what if his love turns out to be necessary? And indeed, in response, one hears: “I don’t love him, because I can only love what is generous, what understands me, what is noble ...” If the Dreamer waits until the former feelings completely subside, then the girl’s gratitude and love will go to him alone. Young people joyfully dream of a joint future. At the moment of their parting, the groom suddenly appears. With a cry, trembling, Nastenka breaks free from the hero's hands and rushes towards him. Already, it would seem, the coming true hope for happiness, for real life leaves the Dreamer. He silently looks after the lovers.
The next morning, the hero receives a letter from the happy girl asking for forgiveness for the involuntary deceit and with gratitude for his love, which "cured" her "broken heart". One of these days she is getting married. But her feelings are contradictory: “Oh God! if I could love you both at the same time!” And yet the Dreamer must remain "forever friend, brother ...". Again he is alone in the suddenly "older" room. But even fifteen years later, he fondly recalls his short-lived love: “May you be blessed for a moment of bliss and happiness that you gave to another, lonely, grateful heart! A whole minute of bliss! But is this not enough even for the whole human life? .. "
F.M. Dostoevsky wrote the story "White Nights" in the last months of the autumn of 1847, soon, already in 1848, the work was published by the journal "Domestic Notes".
Earlier, the writer was already interested in the topic of "Petersburg dreamers", on this topic in 1847 he wrote several articles-feuilletons, which were included in the large feuilleton "Petersburg Chronicle". But Dostoevsky published these articles almost anonymously, signing feuilletons with the letters "F.M." Later, critics found that part of the material from the feuilleton was included in the story "White Nights" - a description of the life of the heroes, their characteristics.
The story is dedicated to A.N. Pleshcheev, a friend of Dostoevsky's youth, and some critics argue that Pleshcheev became the prototype of the protagonist. Some, however, object that the image of the protagonist is the image of the youngest Dostoevsky, and it is no coincidence that the author narrates in the first person, hinting at autobiography.
Analysis of the work
Genre features, composition, content of the story
The writer accompanies the story with two subtitles: "A sentimental novel" and "From the memories of a dreamer." Both subtitles indicate that the story belongs to a certain genre and literary movement. The first - directly, the second - indirectly, because diary entries, memoirs, retrospectives are becoming a common method of presentation in sentimental literature. The writer calls the story a novel, also based on sentimentalist views. For the same reasons, the protagonist of the story has no name, the author simply calls him "The Dreamer".
However, in terms of genre, White Nights is certainly not sentimentalism in its purest form, rather, “sentimental naturalism”, because both the place and the characters are quite real, moreover, deeply social and belong to the category of “little people” praised by Dostoevsky. But in the story "White Nights" there are traces of utopianism, because the characters turned out to be too pure, too sterile, honest in their feelings.
The poem “The Flower” by I. Turgenev served as an epigraph to the story, the lyrical hero of which picks a flower that grows peacefully in the shade of trees and pins it to his buttonhole. Turgenev argues: not for momentary pleasures grow beautiful flowers(read - people live), but a person takes them with an imperious hand, rips them off and dooms them to a quick death (read - seduces, first loves and extols, then leaves). Dostoevsky slightly alters Turgenev's statement, making a question out of it: « …Or was it created in order to stay at least for a moment, in the neighborhood of your heart? That is, Dostoevsky comes to the conclusion that sometimes touching love, walking along the edge of unhappy happiness - this is the whole life, you can devote yourself to this single memory, as the Dreamer does.
Compositionally, the story consists of 5 chapters, 4 chapters are devoted to nights in St. Petersburg, the last one is called "Morning". The construction is symbolic: romantic nights are the stages of the protagonist's consistent love for the main character, the stages of his development, and at the end he, morally perfect, stands on the threshold of his morning - insight. He found love, but unrequited, therefore, on the morning of his insight, he yields his love to another, gets rid of dreams and, experiencing a real feeling, makes a real deed.
Morning simultaneously dispels empty hopes and breaks off a series of wonderful meetings, it becomes the beginning and end of the hero's drama.
The plot of the story
The plot of the story: the young man, on behalf of whom the story is being told, came to St. Petersburg 8 years ago. It works, and free time looks at cityscapes and daydreams. One day, he rescues a girl on the embankment who is being chased by a drunk. The girl tells the Dreamer that she is waiting on the embankment of her lover, who was going to come for her exactly a year ago, having made an appointment for these days. For several days the girl waits for him, but he does not come, and she begins to despair. The dreamer communicates with Nastenka, takes upon himself the transfer of the letter to her lover, and falls in love with the girl himself. Nastenka also falls in love, and they are even going to get married, when suddenly the former lover appears again and takes Nastenka away. A cold, dank Petersburg morning is coming, the Dreamer feels sobering and devastated.
main characters
The main character of the story is the Dreamer - the author's favorite image of a lonely person, completely isolated from outside world and living in vicious circle your dreams.
Dreamer - 26-year-old resident of St. Petersburg. He is educated, but poor, has certain prospects, but has no worldly desires. He serves somewhere, but does not converge with colleagues and other people around him - for example, women. He is not interested in the domestic side of life, nor in money, nor in girls, he is constantly immersed in ghostly romantic dreams and during periods of contact with the world around him experiences a painful feeling of being alien to this world. He compares himself with a dirty kitten, not needed by anyone in the world and experiencing reciprocal resentment and enmity. However, he would not be unresponsive if they needed him - after all, people are not repulsive to him, he would be ready to help someone, capable of empathy.
The dreamer is a typical “little man” (social position, inability to act, immobility, invisibility of existence) and an “extra person” (he feels himself to be such, despising only himself for his uselessness).
The main character, 17-year-old Nastenka, is opposed to the Dreamer as an active character. Despite the outward fragility and naivety and young age, she is stronger than the Dreamer in the search for happiness. The writer uses many words with diminutive suffixes - "eyes", "pens", "pretty", emphasizing the childishness and spontaneity of the image, its playfulness, restlessness, like a child's. The habits of a child, the heart is - real woman: skillfully uses the help of an adult man, but at the same time, clearly recognizing his sensitive and indecisive nature, stubbornly does not notice his feelings. At a critical moment, however, when it becomes clear that her lover has abandoned her, she quickly orients herself and finally notices these very feelings. At the moment of the appearance of a potential husband, he again looks at the feelings of the Dreamer as a friendly participation. However, is it worth blaming the girl for changeability? In the end, she faithfully waited for her main happiness for a whole year, and there is no insincerity in the fact that she almost went over to the Dreamer - the life of a lonely fragile girl in a large and hostile Petersburg is not easy and dangerous, she needs support and support.
Nastenka writes a letter to the Dreamer thanking him for participating in her story. Having received the letter, the Dreamer does not feel sadness - he sincerely wishes the girl happiness and, repeating the idea of the epigraph, says that a whole minute of bliss with Nastenka is what is enough for a human life.
Dostoevsky's contemporaries saw French utopian ideas in the story, which they were all passionate about. The main thesis of the utopians of the 1840s was the desire for a silent feat, sacrifice, the rejection of love in favor of other people. Dostoevsky was deeply devoted to these ideas, which is why the type of love he describes is so ideal.
Consider summary story "White Nights" by Dostoevsky. The genre of this work was defined by the writer himself as a "sentimental novel". However, in the form of "White Nights" - a story. It belongs to a cycle of novels and stories that were created in St. Petersburg before Fyodor Mikhailovich was convicted in the case of the Petrashevites.
The composition of the story
The work "White Nights" by Dostoevsky consists of 5 chapters, which have the names: "Night 1", "Night 2", etc. The story describes 4 nights in total. The fifth chapter is called "Morning". This reflects the dynamics of development in the work of the plot - from sleep to awakening.
First night
The hero of the work "White Nights" by Dostoevsky has been living in St. Petersburg for eight years. At the same time, he could not make a single acquaintance in the city. The hero knows almost all of St. Petersburg. He knows many people by sight, sees every day on the streets. The old man is one of those acquaintances. The hero meets him on the Fontanka at a certain hour. If both are in good mood they bow to each other. Familiar to the Dreamer and at home. He even sometimes imagines that they are talking to him, just as the hero himself communicates with them with pleasure. He has favorites among the houses, there are also short friends. The dreamer has been tormented by anxiety for three days now. The reason is the fear of loneliness. The city was empty, as the inhabitants went to their dachas. The dreamer is ready to go with them, but no one invited him, as if everyone had forgotten him, as if he was a complete stranger to them.
Returning after a walk at a late hour, the hero of the story "White Nights" by Dostoevsky saw a girl on the embankment. She gazed intently into the water of the canal. This girl was crying, and she walked past him on the sidewalk while Dreamer tried to find words of comfort. He did not dare to follow her. Suddenly, not far from this stranger was a drunken gentleman who hurried after her. Then the hero rushed at him with a gnarled stick. He left the lady alone. The dreamer told her that he creates whole novels in his imagination. However, in fact, he has never even met women, because he is very timid. The girl replies that she even likes such modesty. The hero hopes to see her again and asks the girl to come back to the embankment the next night. She promises to be here at nine o'clock, but begs the hero not to fall in love with her and rely only on friendship. The girl has a secret that she does not want to tell. The dreamer feels so happy that he wanders around the city all night and cannot return home. This completes the description of the first chapter of Dostoevsky's work. "White Nights", the summary of which interests us, continues with the following events.
Second night
The lady asks when meeting the Dreamer to tell her his story. He replies that he has no history. The girl also has a blind grandmother who does not let her go anywhere. After the girl got naughty 2 years ago, the grandmother sewed her dress to hers. Now the Dreamer's interlocutor is forced to read aloud to the old woman and sit at home. The hero replies that he considers himself a dreamer, and only then remembers that he still does not know the name of his companion. The girl introduces herself as Nastenka. The dreamer tells her about his dreams. He lived in his dreams to 26 years old, even celebrates the "anniversary of his sensations." Nastenka tells the hero the story of her life.
The girl's father and mother died very early, and so she stayed with her grandmother. Once, when this old woman fell asleep, Nastenka persuaded Thekla, a deaf worker, to sit down in her place, and she herself went to her friend. When the old woman woke up and asked about something, Thekla ran away, frightened, because she could not understand what her grandmother was asking her about. One day, a new tenant moved into the mezzanine of my grandmother's house. He began to supply Nastenka with books, invited her, along with the old woman, to the theater for the play "The Barber of Seville". The three of them visit the theater a few more times after that. Then the tenant says that he must leave for Moscow. Secretly from her grandmother, Nastenka collects things, because she wants to go with him. The tenant says he can't marry the girl yet. But he will certainly come for her in a year, when he arranges his affairs. Now he has been in the city for three days, but still has not come to Nastenka. The dreamer invites her to write a letter to her beloved and promises to pass it on through the girl's acquaintances. Nastenka gives him a long-written and sealed letter. The heroes say goodbye. The work "White Nights" by Dostoevsky continues in the next chapter.
third night
On a rainy and cloudy day, the hero of the work realizes that Nastenka's love for him was only the joy of a close date with another. The girl came to meet the hero an hour earlier, because she wanted to see her beloved and hoped that he would certainly come. However, he did not appear. The dreamer reassures the girl, making various assumptions: he might not have received the letter, perhaps he cannot come now, or he answered, but the letter will come a little later. The girl hopes to see her beloved the next day, but she does not leave a feeling of annoyance. Nastenka laments that her lover is not at all like the Dreamer, who is so kind to her. Thus ends the next chapter of the work "White Nights". The story continues with a description of the fourth night.
fourth night
At 9 o'clock next day the heroes were already on the embankment. But the man does not appear. The hero confesses his love to the girl, says that he understands her feelings for his beloved and treats them with respect. Nastenka replies that this man betrayed her, and therefore she will try with all her might to stop loving him. If the Dreamer can wait until the old feelings subside completely, then Nastenka's love and gratitude will go to him. Young people dream joyfully about a joint future.
Suddenly, at the moment of their parting, the groom appears. Nastenka, trembling and screaming, breaks free from the Dreamer's arms and rushes towards him. She disappears with her lover. The Dreamer from the work "White Nights" looked after them for a long time ... Dostoevsky describes chapter by chapter how the internal state of the main characters changed, who seem to make the transition from sleep to awakening in the story. This happens in the next chapter, which is called "Morning".
Morning
On a rainy and gloomy day, Matryona, a worker, brought a letter from Nastenka to the Dreamer. The girl apologized and thanked him for his love. She promises to keep him forever in her memory, and also asks the Dreamer not to forget her. Several times the hero re-read the letter, tears welling up in his eyes. The dreamer mentally thanks Nastenka for the moment of bliss and happiness that the girl gave him. One of these days Nastenka is getting married. However, the girl's feelings are contradictory. She writes in a letter that she would like to "love you both". However, the Dreamer is forced to remain forever only a brother, a friend. He was again alone in the room, suddenly "older". However, even after 15 years, the Dreamer remembers with tenderness his short-lived love.
A few facts about the work
So, we have described the event outline of the work that Dostoevsky created. "White Nights", a summary of which, of course, artistic features does not convey the story, was written by Fyodor Mikhailovich in 1848. Today the work is included in school curriculum in literature along with other works of this writer. Very interesting in this story, as in other works of Fyodor Mikhailovich, are the characters. "White Nights" Dostoevsky dedicated to A. N. Pleshcheev, a poet and friend of his youth.
Criticism
With regard to criticism, we note the following. The work "White Nights" (Dostoevsky) caused positive reviews almost immediately after the first publication. Such well-known critics as A. V. Druzhinin, S. S. Dudyshkin, A. A. Grigoriev, N. A. Dobrolyubov, E. V. Tur and others responded to him.
Fedor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky
White Nights
... Or was he created in order
To stay even for a moment
In the neighborhood of your heart?...
Iv. Turgeniev
NIGHT ONE
It was a wonderful night, such a night, which can only happen when we are young, dear reader. The sky was so starry, such a bright sky, that, looking at it, one involuntarily had to ask oneself: can all kinds of angry and capricious people live under such a sky? This is also a young question, dear reader, a very young one, but God bless you more frequently! .. Speaking of capricious and various angry gentlemen, I could not help but recall my well-behaved behavior all that day. From the very morning some amazing melancholy began to torment me. It suddenly seemed to me that everyone was leaving me, alone, and that everyone was retreating from me. It is, of course, everyone has the right to ask: who are these all? because I have been living in St. Petersburg for eight years already, and I have not been able to make a single acquaintance. But what do I need dating? I already know all of Petersburg; that's why it seemed to me that everyone was leaving me, when all of Petersburg got up and suddenly left for the dacha. I was afraid to be left alone, and for three whole days I wandered around the city in deep anguish, absolutely not understanding what was happening to me. Whether I go to the Nevsky, whether I go to the garden, whether I wander along the embankment - not a single person from those whom I am used to meeting in the same place, at a certain hour, for a whole year. They don't know me, of course, but I know them. I know them briefly; I almost studied their faces - and admire them when they are cheerful, and mope when they are clouded. I almost made friends with an old man whom I meet every single day, at a certain hour, on the Fontanka. The physiognomy is so important, thoughtful; still whispering under his breath and waving his left hand, and in his right he has a long gnarled cane with a gold knob. Even he noticed me and takes a spiritual part in me. If it happens that I am not at the same place of the Fontanka at a certain hour, I am sure that the melancholy will attack him. That's why we sometimes almost bow to each other, especially when both are in good location spirit. The other day, when we had not seen each other for two whole days and on the third day we met, we were already there and grabbed our hats, but fortunately we came to our senses in time, lowered our hands and walked beside each other with participation. I also know at home. When I walk, everyone seems to be running ahead of me into the street, looking at me through all the windows and almost saying: “Hello; how is your health? and, thank God, I am healthy, and a floor will be added to me in the month of May. Or: “How are you? and I'll be fixed tomorrow." Or: “I almost burned out and, moreover, got scared,” etc. Of these, I have favorites, I have short friends; one of them intends to be treated by an architect this summer. I’ll stop by every day on purpose so that they don’t close up somehow, God save it! .. But I will never forget the story with one pretty light pink house. It was such a pretty little stone house, it looked at me so affably, it looked at its clumsy neighbors with such pride that my heart rejoiced when I happened to pass by. Suddenly, last week, I was walking down the street and, as I looked at my friend, I heard a plaintive cry: “They are painting me yellow!” Villains! barbarians! they spared nothing: no columns, no cornices, and my friend turned as yellow as a canary. I almost burst into bile over this occasion, and I still have not been able to see my mutilated poor man, who was painted in the color of the celestial empire.
So, you understand, reader, how I am familiar with all of Petersburg.
I have already said that for three whole days I was tormented by anxiety, until I guessed the reason for it. And on the street it was bad for me (that one is gone, that one is gone, where did such and such go?) - and at home I was not myself. For two evenings I sought: what do I lack in my corner? Why was it so embarrassing to stay there? - and with bewilderment I examined my green smoky walls, the ceiling, hung with cobwebs, which Matryona bred with great success, reviewed all my furniture, examined each chair, thinking, is there a problem here? (because if at least one chair is not standing the same as it was yesterday, then I am not myself) looked out the window, and all in vain ... it was not at all easier! I even took it into my head to call on Matryona and immediately gave her a paternal reprimand for cobwebs and in general for slovenliness; but she only looked at me in surprise and walked away without answering a word, so that the web still hangs safely in place. Finally, only this morning I guessed what was the matter. E! Yes, they are running away from me to the dacha! Forgive me for the trivial word, but I was not in the mood for a high style ... because, after all, everything that was in St. Petersburg either moved or moved to the dacha; because every respectable gentleman of respectable appearance who hired a cab, before my eyes, immediately turned into a respectable father of the family, who, after ordinary official duties, sets off lightly to the bowels of his family, to the dacha; because every passer-by now had a completely special look, which almost said to everyone he met: “We, gentlemen, are only here, in passing, but in two hours we will leave for the dacha.” If a window opened, on which at first thin fingers, white as sugar, drummed, and the head of a pretty girl stuck out, calling a peddler with pots of flowers, it immediately, immediately seemed to me that these flowers were bought only in this way, that is, not at all for in order to enjoy spring and flowers in a stuffy city apartment, and that very soon everyone will move to the dacha and take the flowers with them. Moreover, I had already made such progress in my new, special kind of discoveries, that I could already unmistakably, by one look, designate in which dacha someone lives. The inhabitants of the Kamenny and Aptekarsky islands or the Peterhof road were distinguished by the studied elegance of receptions, smart summer suits and excellent carriages in which they arrived in the city. The inhabitants of Pargolovo and farther away, at first glance, "inspired" with their prudence and solidity; the visitor to Krestovsky Island was notable for his imperturbably cheerful look. Did I manage to meet a long procession of draft cabs lazily walking with reins in their hands near carts loaded with whole mountains of all kinds of furniture, tables, chairs, Turkish and non-Turkish sofas and other household belongings, on which, in addition to all this, she often sat on the very top a wagon, a puny cook who cherishes her master's goods like the apple of her eye; if I looked at the boats, heavily laden with household utensils, gliding along the Neva or the Fontanka, to the Black River or the islands, the carts and boats were multiplied ten, lost in my eyes; it seemed that everything got up and set off, everything moved in whole caravans to the dacha; it seemed that all of Petersburg was threatening to turn into a desert, so that at last I felt ashamed, offended and sad: I had absolutely nowhere and no reason to go to the dacha. I was ready to leave with every cart, to leave with every gentleman of respectable appearance who hired a cab; but no one, decidedly no one, invited me; as if they had forgotten me, as if I really were a stranger to them!
I walked a lot and for a long time, so that I had already quite managed, as usual, to forget where I was, when suddenly I found myself at the outpost. In an instant, I felt cheerful, and I stepped over the barrier, walked between the sown fields and meadows, did not hear fatigue, but felt only with my whole body that some kind of burden was falling from my soul. All the passers-by looked at me so amiably that they almost bowed resolutely; everyone was so excited about something, every single one was smoking cigars. And I was glad, as never happened to me before. It was as if I suddenly found myself in Italy - nature struck me so strongly, a half-sick city dweller who almost suffocated in the city walls.
There is something inexplicably touching in our St. Petersburg nature, when, with the onset of spring, it suddenly shows all its might, all the powers bestowed on it by heaven, becomes pubescent, discharged, full of flowers ... Somehow involuntarily she reminds me of that stunted girl and an ailment, at which you sometimes look with pity, sometimes with a kind of compassionate love, sometimes you simply do not notice it, but which suddenly, for a moment, somehow inadvertently becomes inexplicably, wonderfully beautiful, and you, amazed, intoxicated , you involuntarily ask yourself: what force made these sad, thoughtful eyes shine with such fire? what caused the blood on those pale, emaciated cheeks? what poured passion over these tender features? Why is this chest heaving? what so suddenly called strength, life and beauty into the face of the poor girl, made him shine with such a smile, perk up with such sparkling, sparkling laughter? You look around, you are looking for someone, you guess ... But the moment passes, and perhaps tomorrow you will meet again the same thoughtful and absent-minded look, as before, the same pale face, the same humility and timidity in movements and even repentance, even traces of some kind of deadly longing and annoyance at a moment's infatuation ... And it's a pity for you that so soon, so irrevocably withered instantaneous beauty, that it flashed before you so deceptively and in vain - it's a pity because even you didn't have time to love her...
Let's start with the fact that Dostoevsky immediately indicated with the title of the work that the events take place in St. Petersburg, and besides, this title is a kind of symbol of the fantastic and unreality of the action. But besides the title itself, the story has two subtitles: "A sentimental novel" and "From the memories of a dreamer." They also tell us a lot. Firstly, about what the genre and storyline is, and secondly, about the fact that the story will go in the first person. True, the question immediately arises: if a dreamer shares his memories, is it worth believing him completely? Let's continue the analysis of the story "White Nights" by Dostoevsky.
The main character of the story - who is he?
Why did the author decide to build the story here in the first person? Thus, Dostoevsky gives the story a certain character - we see a confession, or reflections in an autobiographical bias. Not without reason, many critics agree that the image of the main character resembles the author himself, who is still young. Although there is a version that a close friend of Dostoevsky became the prototype of the hero of the story, and he did not write about himself at all, but about the poet A. Pleshcheev.
It is important to note that the main character does not have a name. Yes, it is not named in any way, and in this way the author strengthened the connection with himself or his friend. In fact, many works show that Dostoevsky constantly thought about the image of a dreamer, and he even planned to sit down to write a novel, completely surrendering to this topic.
Analysis of the work "White Nights" implies a description of the protagonist. He is well educated, he has a lot of strength and he is young, but by nature he is quite timid. This is a lonely dreamer. He dreams of romance, and these thoughts take him away from reality. The dreamer does not think about everyday affairs and worries, performing them only out of habit, but in general he is a stranger in his environment, and the world around him is also completely alien.
In order to depersonalize his hero, Dostoevsky does not even write in detail what service he is in and what he basically does. He is not rich in friends, he never had a girlfriend. All this serves as a pretext for ridicule and the removal of people from it. And it seems to the dreamer himself that he is just a rumpled, dirty kitten, offended by everyone around, and he expects meanness from anyone.
Now let's talk a little about Nastenka - the girl that the author opposes to our dreamer. She is a sophisticated and romantic beauty, soul mate. However, despite this, Nastenka is naive and even childish. Her feelings are sincere and cordial, she wants to defend her happiness, even if she has to take her lover and run away with him, using for this purpose the one she accidentally met. But the girl really needs support herself.
Other details of the "White Nights" analysis
The composition of the story "White Nights" is traditional. There are five chapters in the text, and only one is called "Morning", while the rest are called "Night". The romance of the white nights radically changed the thinking and feelings of the dreamer. When he met Nastenka and fell in love with her, he was saved from unreal dreams and felt that his life was filled with reality. Main character loves a girl purely and disinterestedly, he is even ready to make sacrifices for the sake of this love.
As an epilogue to the story, Dostoevsky uses the last chapter called "Morning". The epilogue is dramatic and exudes hope. Here comes a rainy gray morning, and all the best comes to an end. Beautiful white nights are behind, and loneliness is again next to the dreamer, but this is what is important in the analysis of the work "White Nights": the hero is not offended and not disappointed. He forgave the girl and blessed her.
One of Dostoevsky's most poetic stories, White Nights, is a beautiful utopia and a dream that if a person is honest and disinterested, he can become happy. And what a romantic atmosphere created thanks to the fantastic white nights of St. Petersburg!
