The truth and lies in the drama "At the bottom" Gorky

M. Gorky always attracted the unity and struggle of opposites (not without reason he was a Marxist): society and personality, wealth and poverty, good and evil, truth and lies. In the drama "At the bottom" the author was able to demonstrate especially vividly the unbearable weight of truth and the salvation of lies for a weak, broken man. Many ambiguous Russian works saw the light not at home, but abroad. The drama "At the bottom" was no exception. Gorky wrote it in late 1901 - early 1902. Original titles: "At the bottom of life", "Without the sun", "Night-lodge", "The bottom".

The play was allowed only in the Moscow Art Theater, where the first production was performed on December 18, 1902 by the directors Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko. In 1904 she received the Griboedov Prize.

The world of slums

For the first time on the scene there were people of the "bottom" - thieves, prostitutes, gamblers and drunkards, whom the author collected in a nightmarish doss house.

A sad situation draws for his heroes Maxim Gorky - at the bottom of society should be scary: "a cellar that looks like a cave," a low heavy ceiling, "unpainted and dirty" furniture. Of course, there is debauchery, drunkenness, gambling, fights, endless quarrels, poverty and indifference. The author does not spare the black paint - the heroes of the work are in no way inferior to their place of residence.

Inhabitants of the "bottom"

In the doss house live a young thief Ashes, a prostitute Nastya, a ruined nobleman (baron), who lives for Nastin's account, a locksmith Ticks and his dying wife, an alcoholic actor, a card game sharpshooter Satin, a Bubnov cap and others, to match what has already been called. Contains this stash greedy and disgusting in its ostentatious piety Kostylev, sincerely confident that "the kindness of the heart can not be equated with money." Therefore, he cuts three skins from his poor guests so that they can buy oil for the lamp. It can be said that Gorky in this drama created the "noir" style - however, many Russian dramas sin with exaggerated hopelessness.

Initially, the characters of the play endlessly bickering about everyday topics - the Baron does not want revenge on the room, then the Tick snaps at the accusations of indifference to the sick wife, then the merchant Kvashnya discusses the advisability of marriage. When the wandering old man Luke appears in the doss house, the conversations of her regulars suddenly acquire a philosophical turn. This is where the truth and the lie in the drama "At the bottom" really come into play.

The trace of Christianity in the work

The newcomer favorably differs from the permanent inhabitants of the "Kostilev choruses" by the fact that it retains an elementary humanity. Some critics say that Luke is a negative character, and even his name comes from the "evil one". But apparently, this is not so: at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Gorky was an adherent of the theory of god-building, which tried to reconcile Marxism with Christianity, based on a certain similarity of philosophies.

The truth and lies in the drama "At the bottom" are most bizarre intertwined in the image of Luke, who is more like an evangelical character. His ideas are largely Christian: he is really trying to console the mourners (and, perhaps, in this Gorky and sees the main purpose of religion). The old man reassures the dying Anna, listens sympathetically to the fictitious love story of Nastya, a prostitute, tells the alcoholic actor about the hospital where they will be cured, convinces Vaska the thief to go to Siberia and start a new honest life there.

Luke believes that the lost hope is doomed to perish, and tells a parable about a man who dreamed of leaving for the "righteous land" all his life. Learning that it does not exist, he hangs up (the actor-alcoholic who lost his faith in curing ends up in the same way that, in fact, Gorky's play ends).

So all the same: is it true or false? Respect or pity?

It is not known whether the author intentionally identifies hope with illusion, thus turning it into a lie, but it is precisely in this regard that Satin enters into a kind of polemic with Luka. He read a lot of boy, then he killed a man, protecting his sister, in a prison he got addicted to cards and began to make a living by cheating. Satin is ironic, intelligent, educated. His outlook in something coincides with the views of Luke: both believe that the center of the universe is a person and his free choice. But if Luka calls "to regret a man in time," for Satin, pity is unacceptable: "We must respect a person ... do not humiliate him with pity ...".

When cohabitants reproach the old man for lying, the intelligent gambler defends him passionately: "There are many people who lie out of pity for their neighbor ... There is a consoling lie, a reconciling lie." He himself, however, regards it as an unequivocal evil, but recognizes in part the inevitability: "Who is weak in soul ... and who lives by other people's juices ... so the lie is needed".

Literary criticism and author's design

Truth and lies in the drama "At the bottom" are contrasted not only in the opinions of the heroes. The main contradiction is, as usual, between word and deed, idea and reality. Satin can talk as much as he likes about the fact that a person "sounds proudly" - he himself, however, is nothing more than a card sharper who despises work: "Work? For what? To be full? ". No, of course, one must be "above satiety." To work, therefore, is reprehensible, and it is not to cheat on cards.

It is very good that now we are free from the socialist ideology, the hostage of which was Maxim Gorky. "At the bottom" - the drama is interesting and profound, it is unlikely that it should be perceived only as a critique of capitalist society. It is possible that the author tried to draw a border not only between truth and lies, but also by a man who sounds proudly, and in that in which from his former greatness nothing remains.

Look Into the Abyss

One of the characters of the play very clearly describes the reasons for his stay "at the bottom": "As I begin to fill in - all the drink, one skin remains ... And yet - I'm lazy. I do not like passion for work. "

In the last act Nastya formulates this line finally: "... sweep you like a rub ... somewhere in the pit." This sounds like a rather unpleasant idea that "superfluous people" must be destroyed, but not consoled by human lies, as if the life of each person is not in vain. In this case, the death of the actor, who finally realized the futility of his existence, is very symbolic.