Why Onegin did not find his happiness. Why can't Eugene Onegin be called a useful member of society and the state and be happy himself? Why Onegin now fell in love with Tatyana

The work of Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin describes Eugene Onegin as a narcissistic, selfish person, incapable of deep feelings and frank actions. Eugene Onegin is a smart, perspicacious, well-read, gallant man. Only now it seems to him that the whole world should revolve around him alone. Everything he did came from his desire to do something for himself. There was no openness of soul in him, unlimited generosity and desire to help people.

As you know, people who put themselves at the forefront are rarely happy. They do not know how to open their hearts, love, respect other people's feelings and desires. This makes him lonely and unhappy.

Eugene Onegin does not believe in happiness - "he is too disappointed in life. An idle life becomes the source of his constant melancholy. The change in lifestyle associated with moving to an inherited estate does not justify hopes. The hero turns out to be superfluous here too, bringing misfortune to other people. "The suffering egoist" is called Onegin in Russian criticism, and one cannot but agree with this. A person who is able to love, but not capable of renunciation “in the name of his beloved, her happiness and tranquility, “he cannot seek happiness in other areas than his passions and is therefore doomed to disappointment.

It's not a very simple question. The image of the protagonist is close to Pushkin himself. He endowed him with the distinctive features of his contemporary generation. Onegin is smart, educated, well-read. “He is enlightened: he replaces the corvée with quitrent for his peasants, which is more progressive” and less burdensome for them.

He is decent. He accepts the girl's letter, which at that time was impossible to admit. If he had given publicity to the letter, Tatyana would have been compromised, there could have been no talk of any marriage with the prince. Finally, he dresses tastefully, "like a London dandy."

And with these virtues, Onegin does not find happiness. He is lonely, having played love and friendship in high society, he has moved away from society. As an “intellectual decent person, he saw the vices of this society, its underside. Empty endless conversations, balls with bridesmaids, wretchedness under the external rich tinsel - he did not want to do this anymore.

At the same time, he "alien ... respected" worthy ones. He did not impose his friendship, did not scatter compliments, but simply appreciated the good and the good. After all, he sincerely fell in love with Lensky, although he was not predisposed to him as a romantic hero.

Onegin does not find happiness, he is a reflective personality, and this is a good sign, such personalities always develop. His trouble is that he did not immediately understand that Tatyana is a kindred spirit, that she was sent to him by God. But nothing prevents them from loving each other. Not to start a love affair "on the side", this would extinguish their feelings, but to love.

If the relationship between Onegin and Tatyana were smooth and happy, it would not be Pushkin, and the novel in verse "Eugene Onegin" would not be "an encyclopedia of Russian life." Sugary novels, where the husband would eventually “wear a quilted robe”, are written by other authors, which everyone has safely forgotten about.

From such a novel Olga. She cried for Lensky, fell in love with a lancer and happily left her native places.

Onegin does not find happiness, because he is an integral rich nature, and it is always not easy for such individuals in life.

Answer left Guest

It seems that the reader of "Eugene Onegin" has repeatedly wondered why the main characters were not happy, what made Tatyana and Evgeny far apart in life?

The development of the conflict we are talking about begins in the third chapter, when Onegin meets the Larin family and Tatyana falls in love with him, suffers, writes a letter and waits for an answer to it. The heroine saw Eugene only once and fell in love with him for life. This is explained by the fact that dreamy, endowed with an ardent imagination and a wayward soul, she recognized in Onegin the ideal that she compiled from sentimental novels. On the other hand, she caught a resemblance to herself in the young man and believed that they were made for each other. Tatyana writes a letter to Onegin, suffering and counting on his nobility:

I'm writing to you - what more?
What else can I say?
Now I know in your will
Punish me with contempt.

But Onegin could not appreciate and accept Tatyana's impulse, because by this time, as the narrator says about him, "he was considered an invalid in love":

He no longer fell in love with beauties,

And dragged somehow;
Refuse - instantly comforted;
They will change - I was glad to rest ...

Hence the didactic, moralizing tone of his answer to Tatyana. Actually, his answer is more of a confession, a frank admission that he does not want to limit his life to "the circle of his home." And if he was “captivated by the family picture”, then he would not look for a bride, except for her. Tatyana could accept his answer as a declaration of love, but since the hero focuses so much on the unwillingness to live in a "home circle", she scares the girl away, but does not cool her feelings. Onegin did not see the most important thing in Tatyana: she is one of those whole poetic natures who can love only once. He will understand this at the end of the novel, when she, in her rebuke to him, will say as openly and trustingly as in a letter: "I love you (why be cunning?)".

Further, Tatyana's love for Onegin develops and deepens. In his absence, the heroine, yearning, enters the empty house and gets acquainted with the library, with notes made on the books, that L reveals to her the inner world of such a dear person. Tatyana begins to understand him better and realizes how he lives, why he suffers. But was she able to join his experiences with her heart? No, she realizes everything only with her mind, since these ideas are alien to her, incomprehensible.

However, from that moment on, Tatyana begins to change, internally she gradually turns from a naive girl into a secular lady, who will then so amaze Onegin's imagination. Tatyana travels with her mother to Moscow to start a new life. And although in Moscow the thought of Onegin does not leave the heroine, she drives her away, trying to control herself. But here the heroes meet again, Tatyana did not betray her excitement:

Hey! not that she shuddered
Ile suddenly turned pale, red...
Her eyebrow did not move;
She didn't even purse her lips.

But it is her composure that now conquers Onegin in a way that sweet simplicity and openness could not conquer. The author-narrator describes in great detail the experiences of the hero in love, so that the reader does not doubt their sincerity. Tatyana believes him and therefore confesses her feelings, but rejects him because she is faithful to her husband and values ​​her position in the world. Onegin is rejected and unhappy, but it is worth considering whether he would be happy if Tatyana answered his impulse. Most likely, he would soon be disappointed and become bored again, because he does not need a calm, measured life, full of everyday worries, he needs a storm of passions, impulses, even misfortune, so that he feels harmonious in the world. Tatyana would not be happy with him either, they wanted too different things from life.

On the example of Onegin and Tatyana, we can conclude that love is not always a guarantee of happiness.

People, especially those with children, know how difficult it is sometimes to choose a name for a baby. Long before his birth (and some - many years before conception) they are already choosing a name.

It is easiest for kings: Louis XIII, XIV, XV ... Henry IV, V, VI, VIII ... It is more difficult for a simple person: you need to honor your beloved grandfather, a rich aunt, some bloody maniac (daddy Sanchez called the future terrorist Ilyich, guessed ), the Spaniard, without hesitation, gives the boy five names and pleases everyone, including the Virgin (German case: Erich Maria Remarque), the family crowds around the cradle, it sometimes comes to a fight.

The author is one. He himself bore, he himself gave birth, he himself is looking for a name, he is tormented. Speaking names are not tricky. Kuteikin is a drunkard, Kabanikha is a pig, Molchalin is a quiet, vtirusha, careerist ... These are names-characteristics.

And Onegin? Why is he Eugene? It cannot be a coincidence. Moreover, Pushkin himself admitted:

I was already thinking about the shape of the plan
And as a hero I will name;
While my romance
I finished the first chapter...

This is the 60th stanza, the last stanza of the first chapter.

Eugene is a strange name. Of course, Kolya, Vanya, Petya (Greek, Jew, Roman) were also once strangers, but they became Russified so long ago that they became their own. But Eugene - no, something in him is not ours.

Maybe French? Moreover, Pushkin's lyceum nickname was French. French is the language of the Russian nobility...

Tatyana writes her famous letter to Onegin in French, in particular, also because

She didn't know Russian very well.
Didn't read our magazines
And expressed with difficulty
In your native language.

Everyone is so used to these verses and to the fact that Pushkin is a genius; they don’t notice how he clumsily wrote “she didn’t know Russian well.” Correct: “she spoke Russian poorly” or “she knew Russian poorly” (language).

And “in Russian is bad” is used in the sense of “as it usually happens here” or, more simply, “in the Russian manner”. For example, she was bad at laying asphalt in Russian.

Eugene Onegin as imagined by Pushkin.

She did not know Russian well - this is Pushkin on purpose, this is a mockery both of the heroine, whom he mimicked, and of the reader ...

Oh yes! Everything around was French; in the West the star of Napoleon shone; Onegin's child was taught "poor Frenchman" (now they write "wretched" - Pushkin is corrected, they spoil the rhyme "... Frenchman ub ohoy did not bother morality ohoy”, make “wretched - strict”, but in accordance with the concepts of modern proofreading). Onegin speaks excellent French, but he is not at all French and certainly not German. Pushkin liked his character.

... The conditions of light overthrowing the burden,
How he, lagging behind the hustle and bustle,
I became friends with him at that time.
I liked his features
Dreams involuntary devotion
Inimitable strangeness
And a sharp, chilled mind.

Coldness, originality (inimitable strangeness) - smacks of an Englishman. And very clearly.

Here is my Onegin at large;
Shaved in the latest fashion
Like a dandy london dressed

How a London dandy is dressed. Remains silent in an important dispute. Reads Adam Smith (English economist) ... And what does he eat?

In front of him is a bloody roast-beef...

No: early feelings in him cooled down; (and in French they don’t cool to death, in Russian they don’t cool to death)

He was tired of the light noise;
The beauties didn't last long
The subject of his habitual thoughts;
Treason managed to tire;
Friends and friendship are tired,
Then, which could not always

Beef-steaks...(again English food with English spelling)

... And pour sharp words,
When I had a headache.

Onegin also misses English.

Illness whose cause
It's high time to find
Like an English spin
In short: Russian melancholy
She took possession of him little by little;
He shoot himself, thank God,
Didn't want to try
But life has completely cooled off.
Like Child-Harold, gloomy, languid...

Also Childe Harold (Byron's English hero). And then also in the village everyone decided that he (Onegin) was a most dangerous eccentric.

Well, then in the second chapter from abroad galloped Lensky. That's right, he rushed, but did not arrive; because the plot had to move. Now he will introduce Onegin to Tatiana Larina and...

But first, Lensky, who had been in love with Olga from an early age, paid tribute to the grave of his bride's father, Dmitry Larin, he was a good man.

He was a simple and kind gentleman,
And where his ashes lie,
The headstone reads:
“Humble sinner, Dmitry Larin,
Lord's servant and foreman,
Under the stone, Sim eats the world.

Returned to his penates,
Vladimir Lensky visited
The neighbor's monument is humble,
And he dedicated his breath to the ashes;
And for a long time my heart was sad.
Poor Yorick! 16 - he said dejectedly, -
He held me in his arms.
How often did I play as a child
His Ochakov medal!
He read Olga for me,
He said: will I wait for the day? .. "
And, full of sincere sadness,
Vladimir immediately drew
He has a funeral madrigal.

After the words "Poor Yorick!" there is a number "16" - this is a note by Pushkin himself; there are 44 of them in Onegin.

Note #16 looks like this: "Poor Yorik!" - Hamlet's exclamation over the jester's skull. (See Shakespeare and Stern.)"

"Cm." means "look". But no one fulfills this Pushkin's instruction. Because everyone already knows about Hamlet with a skull, there is no need to look at Shakespeare. A "see Stern"... firstly, he is not at hand; and secondly, why watch Stern if we already know everything from Shakespeare.

1825 edition (long before the end of the novel).

But if you still do what Pushkin asked - take, for example, Lawrence Stern's novel "The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman" (one of the funniest novels in world literature, a hooligan thing, it's even hard to believe that the priest wrote), - if we take this novel, then in chapter XII we read:

“Yevgeny saw that his friend was dying, heartbroken: he shook hands with him - - and quietly left the room, all in tears. Yorick followed Yevgeny with his eyes to the door - then closed them - and did not open them again.

He rests in his graveyard, in the parish, under a smooth marble slab, which his friend Eugene, with the permission of his executors, erected on his grave, making an inscription on it of just three words, serving him both as an epitaph and an elegy: “Alas, poor YORIC!"

Ten times a day, Yorick's spirit is comforted by hearing this tombstone read in many different mournful ways, testifying to universal compassion and respect for him: - - the path crosses the churchyard at the very edge of his grave - and everyone who passes by, involuntarily stops, casts a glance at her - - and sighs, continuing on his way: "Alas, poor Yorick!"

The double dash is a rarity in literature. An additional way to give a touch of mockery to "various plaintive modes." And Eugene (see Stern) - an eccentric young man, a violator of decency and the rules of a solid society - is a most dangerous eccentric.

That's where the name Onegin comes from and, in a sense, the character. Touchy academicians who for 185 years have not reached such a simple thought, academicians who for almost 200 years were too lazy to do an elementary thing: cm dismiss (and honor) Stern, they will say that this is “just a version”.

Let version. But it's not mine. It's not me who wrote "see. Stern".

All other versions are versions of wise literary critics. And this one is copyrighted. We must respect.

P.S. On Tuesday, February 7, at 10:30 pm, on the Kultura channel, in the program The Glass Bead Game, the novel in verse Eugene Onegin will be analyzed. I don’t know if the viewers will notice this, but during the recording of the program, there was a feeling that some important participants were slightly offended when I said why Onegin is Eugene.

The novel by A. S. Pushkin "Eugene Onegin" is an unusual work. There are few events in it, many deviations from the storyline, the story seems to be cut off in half. This is most likely due to the fact that Pushkin in his novel sets fundamentally new tasks for Russian literature - to show the century and people who can be called heroes of their time. Pushkin is a realist, and therefore his heroes are not just people of their time, but, so to speak, people of the society that gave birth to them, that is, they are people of their place. One of the brightest representatives of his time and his place is Eugene Onegin, the protagonist of the novel. What does he represent?

Onegin is a representative of the highest Petersburg society. His childhood passed under the tutelage of foreign tutors. Accepted in the world, Onegin is essentially doomed to loneliness. The motley and monotonous life of St. Petersburg quickly bored Eugene, he was seized by the "Russian melancholy". How to replace secular fun? Onegin, unfortunately, cannot find a use for himself in life. He is trying to escape from idleness, he even tries to write poetry, "no hard work was sickening to him." The hero does not find joy in reading either. It would seem that an unexpected twist of fate - the need to leave for the uncle's village - could lead to changes in Onegin's life. But the spleen awaits him among the "secluded fields."

Vladimir Lensky becomes the only friend of Onegin "out of nothing to do". There is no spiritual closeness between the characters, and where can it come from if Onegin's thoughts are occupied only by Onegin himself.

Eugene failed to understand the purity of Tatyana Larina's passionate feelings. “... I was not created for bliss,” Onegin answers in this way, just in the spirit of novels that were fashionable at that time. The “old-fashioned ardor” that arose in him in the first minute after reading Tatyana’s letter was immediately extinguished, because it was more familiar that way. In general, the history of Onegin's relationship with people proves that Eugene constantly felt his superiority over others, perhaps not without reason, but this superiority makes him "a stranger to everyone", dooms him to loneliness.

Onegin is a person who intellectually rises above other people, above the crowd. He is possessed by the desire for happiness and freedom, but he understands this freedom as "freedom for himself." The conflict of the hero of the novel with the surrounding reality is based only on the fact that this reality causes suffering to him personally, hinders his happiness. In the eighth and ninth articles about Pushkin, V. G. Belinsky characterizes Onegin as a suffering egoist. Eugene suffers because his life did not turn out the way he wanted, but he cannot understand that happiness lies in the ability to be among close people: a devoted friend, a woman who loves him.

Alien to everyone, not bound by anything,

I thought: liberty and peace

replacement for happiness. My God!

How wrong I was, how punished! -

Onegin exclaims, feeling the torment of true love. But the epiphany came too late: Lensky was killed, Tatyana was “given to another” ...

The end of the novel is open. Onegin was left at a crossroads, and we do not know what happened to Onegin next. The versions were very different: some sent Onegin to Senate Square, others talked about the possibility of a love triangle. It is difficult to say who was right, because it is not clear whether those who “respect everyone as zeros, and themselves as ones” are capable of spiritual and moral rebirth.

Eugene Onegin is the hero of Pushkin's famous novel, written by him between 1823 and 1832. Onegin's type was formed under two influences: under the influence of the educational reforms of Emperor Alexander I and the ideas that penetrated Russian society from the West, on the one hand, and under the influence of the superficial education that the younger generation received, on the other. Enlightenment reforms, the government's concerns about improving the life of the peasants, ideas that penetrated from the West - all this was a force that awakened society and called it to mental activity. Some, more than others gifted by nature, began to be weary of an empty, secular life, and a thirst for activity arose in them.

But this thirst did not find an outlet, since the younger generation was not prepared for serious work by their upbringing. Incapacity for serious work awakened a consciousness, perhaps vague, of its impotence, and the result was disappointment and boredom of an unoccupied life. We find all such features in Onegin.

Did Eugene Onegin receive such an upbringing and education that would make him capable of benefiting society and the state?

His upbringing was extremely simple: “at first madame followed him, then changed monsieuree”, who “so that the child would not be exhausted, taught him everything jokingly, did not bother with strict morality, scolded him a little for pranks and took him for a walk in the Summer Garden.”

As you can see, Onegin's upbringing could not contribute to the development of his spiritual powers, and his fruit was only the acquisition of secular manners and the ability to write and read French, and education consisted in acquiring the most superficial information and was expressed in the fact that he could not

Talk about Juvenal; At the end of the letter, put vale, Yes, I remembered, though not without sin, Two verses from the Aeneid ...

And with such an education, Onegin, in the opinion of many judges, resolute and strict, was a learned fellow.

Thus, Onegin was not given proper development: his mind was not prepared for serious activity, his will was not directed towards serious goals. However, Onegin, as a remarkable person, could not be content with an empty secular life and soon became disillusioned with it: "early his feelings cooled down in him." It was then that Onegin first felt the desire for mental work. He locked himself at home, indulged in reading - and it turned out that he lacked serious mental preparation. Not being able to delve deeply into the thoughts of the author and understand them for himself, Onegin soon loses interest in books and abandons them. Then Onegin began to write, but - "nothing came out of his pen." Give what he could write, not being either well-read or mentally developed? Once again, Onegin tried to work: in the countryside, he was busy with the life of his peasants, but limited himself only to their liberation and did nothing more for them.

So, we see that for whatever business Onegin was taken, he was not able to bring it to the end, due to a lack of mental development, on the one hand, due to a lack of developed will, on the other. How can such a person be of benefit to society and the state if he cannot complete any work?

Can Onegin be happy? A happy person can be when all his spiritual forces are developed, able to act, when he realizes that his life is not fruitless, but is important for the lives of others, when he feels content with himself.

Meanwhile, Onegin is not distinguished by a special mental and moral development; he is aware of the futility of his life, is dissatisfied with his whole existence and, as a result, is bored. Boredom seized him in the city, he did not get rid of it in the countryside, despite the fact that she was a "charming corner."

He cannot find any interest in life. In addition, for the sake of secular rules, he commits an act with which his heart does not agree - he fights in a duel with Lensky and kills him, which further increased his dissatisfaction with himself. All this destroys Onegin's happiness and makes him that "Muscovite in Harold's cloak", which sometimes makes us regret.

We meet the characteristic features of Onegin in the heroes of the works of later writers. So, Pechorin, Oblomov represent the types of such people who, being victims of improper and superficial education, become useless members of society, drones. In the absence of the correct development and direction of the will, as in Pechorin, or in the almost complete absence of it, as in Oblomov, they are only able to speak, and not act. Meanwhile, these are all outstanding people who, under different conditions of education, could do a lot, both for the benefit of society and the state, and for their own personal happiness.