What is the tragedy of Larisa Ogudalova based on the play by A.N. Ostrovsky Dowry

Many poets and writers dedicated their lines to women, the beautiful half of humanity. In Russian literature, the image of a woman was drawn with great warmth, her best features were sung: fidelity, sincerity, beauty, intelligence, nobility, tenderness and selfless love.

Larisa is an unusually interesting and attractive character in A.N. Ostrovsky's play "The Dowry".

The meaning of the life of the main character is love. Larisa is a beautiful, smart, gentle, multi-talented girl with a pure soul. She lives in a provincial town, in a family without sufficient means of subsistence. But the girl does not pursue a successful game, she waits and hopes that by true love will come.

Harita Ignatievna is trying to arrange the fate of her daughter, so she is busy looking for the best groom, but the main condition is money. The girl’s mother is not interested in the education and decency of the groom, if only it would be more profitable to marry her daughter.

Frequent receptions are held in the house with the money of Knurov and Vozhevatov. The audience is very diverse: rich merchants and the modest Karandyshev, officials and the brilliant nobleman Sergei Sergeyevich Paratov. Larisa fell in love with Sergey Sergeyevich with all her heart. He is handsome, charming, smart, courteous and prudent. But the girl does not notice his shortcomings, forgives him any sin, dooms himself to shame for his pleasure and is ready to follow him to the ends of the world.

Having squandered his fortune, Paratov is forced to marry a rich bride. Larisa is deceived, disgraced and abandoned. Desperate, she is ready to marry Karandyshev, hoping to find peace with him. Childhood friend Vasya Vozhevatov will play her in toss with an elderly and serious merchant Knurov. , Larisa is not interested in any of them. For them, she is a “thing”, dear and beautiful. Having lost everything, the girl is ready to become a “thing”. Karandyshev’s shot brings her deliverance: she dies free, without becoming a draw. deliverance from torment: "I was looking for love and did not find it. They looked at me and look like fun. No one has ever tried to look into my soul, I have not seen sympathy from anyone, I have not heard a warm, heartfelt word"

Cunning and lies were alien to sincere and proud Larisa, she is a woman with a "hot heart". Such people are not capable of compromise. They can either win or die. Beauty and youth are ruined, but Larisa dies free.

"He showed not only the morals, priorities, traditions of businessmen, boyars, petty officials, but also the personal drama of a woman in love. And this woman is Larisa Ogudalova.

Larisa has a poetic soul, striving for love and happiness. She is well brought up, gifted with beauty and intelligence. Her character is opposed to the foundations of the "new time". Ogudalova lives in a world of businessmen, where the main value is money, where everything is bought and sold, where "every product has a price."

Larisa is the main product of the play. “I am a doll for you; you play with me, break it and leave it,” she says. Her mother and childhood friend Vozhevatov, and Knurov, and Paratov, and even Karandyshev sell it. So, Karandyshev, organizing a dinner in honor of Larisa, decided to simply brag about the acquired “toy”, to show his superiority over others: “I have the right to be proud and proud! She understood me, appreciated and preferred me to everyone.

Vozhevatov and Knurov throw a coin, who will get such an ornament. But Larisa doesn't care about them. All her thoughts and feelings are connected with Paratov, but Paratov is only concerned about his condition. As soon as he has problems, he immediately drives off, forgetting to say goodbye to Larisa. She forgives him. And as soon as he returns, Larisa already feels the precariousness of her position: "You drown me, push me into the abyss." She asks to go away, to the village, as Katerina, the heroine of the play "Thunderstorm", asked to take an oath from Tikhon.

Larisa wants to protect herself from the act to which her heart aspires. But Karandyshev does not support Larisa, just as Tikhon did not support Catherine. Karandyshev only cares about pride. So Larisa is left alone with her fears.

Upon arrival, Paratov does not remember Larisa until Vozhevatov informs him that Larisa is getting married. Paratov also marries, or rather, the process of buying and selling takes place again: in exchange for his freedom, he acquires gold mines. Paratov wants to play last, and Larisa is a great toy. He gives her the worst thing - faith in happiness. “I dream of one bliss: to be your slave; I lost more than my fortune, I lost you,” says Paratov. He deceives, speaks of love, when there is not even a share of pity in him. Larisa believes him and throws herself headlong into the pool.

Paratov's goal is achieved: Larisa, mad with her love, with faith and hope in their joint future, agrees to be his entirely. However, in the morning, when Larisa asks if she can consider herself his wife, Paratov "remembers" that he is bound by chains that he cannot break. This does not stop Larisa: “I will share this burden with you, I will take on most of the burden,” until Paratov admits that he is engaged. Larisa was trampled on, her love was spit on, her feelings were trampled into the dirt, she was laughed at in the face. And again, fate plays with her, Knurov offers to buy her. She is disgusted, she is sick of this world.

She tries to die, but she does not succeed: “What is holding me over this abyss, what is stopping me? Ah, no, no ... not Knurov ... luxury, brilliance ... no, no ... I am far from fuss ... Debauchery ... oh, no ... I just don’t have the determination. In the denouement, Larisa falls in the struggle and takes the position that society assigned her from the very beginning: “Yes, a thing, ... I am a thing, not a person; ... Each thing has its own price ... I am too expensive for you.” But the tragedy of Larisa is different, her words sound like thunder in The Thunderstorm: “I was looking for love and did not find it. They looked at me and look at me as if they were fun ... I was looking for love and did not find it ... it does not exist in the world, there is nothing to look for. I did not find love, so I will look for gold. Larisa is lying, she doesn't need gold, she doesn't need anything. That is why, when Karandyshev shoots Larisa, she thanks him.

In her life there were several options for the outcome of events. Until the last minutes, Larisa loved Paratov, and if she had remained alive, she could have forgiven him once again, and if he accidentally returned to the city again, she would again believe him, and again be deceived. Larisa could become Knurov's luxury, but for her it is exactly death. I would never have become Karandyshev's wife, Karandyshev's patronage is a grave insult. Be that as it may, Larisa would not have found happiness, there is no love for her in this world, because in those days, love was experienced only for money, and not for people.

Let us first of all turn to the character of the heroine. Larisa is a soft, pure girl. She is able to feel the beauty, gifted with artistic talent - singing and music. Larisa can hardly understand that in a society where she must move at the behest of her mother, everything is determined by money, money and again money. She is looking for genuine, sublime love and, as it seems to her, finds it in the person of the "brilliant gentleman" Sergei Sergeyevich Paratov, from a landowner, in accordance with the spirit of the times, retrained into an entrepreneur-shipowner, but who completely retained the master's psychology. Larisa thinks that Paratov loves her as sincerely and recklessly as she loves him. Larisa is poor, she has no dowry, and in a world where they want to buy everything, her beauty becomes a commodity, which the heroine does not even suspect for the time being. But the chosen one of Larisa, not possessing the businesslike habit of millionaires from merchants, like Knurov and Vozhevatov, had already managed to fully assimilate their morality. It is no coincidence that he confesses to Knurov: “I, Moky Parmenych, have nothing cherished; I will find a profit, so I will sell everything, anything. Larisa believes that her lover is a man of a broad soul, able to rise above narrow material interests. She bluntly declares to her fiancé, a petty official, Yuli Kapitonych Karandyshev: “You yourself mean something, you are a good, honest person; but from comparison with Sergei Sergeyevich you lose everything ... Sergey Sergeyevich ... this is the ideal of a man. Here love blinded Larisa's eyes. She is no longer able to take a critical look at Paratov. Meanwhile, Sergey Sergeyevich is not at all the ideal person that his girlfriend in love imagines. Even the episode with the Caucasian officer, which struck Larisa in such a way, when Paratov, in order to demonstrate his composure and accuracy, shot at the coin that she held in her hand, speaks simply of bragging, for the sake of which Sergei Sergeyevich, without hesitation, risks both his own and someone else's life. And Paratov helps the poor not at the call of the soul, but from the desire to work for the public, to demonstrate to the same Larisa the selflessness and breadth of nature. In the finale, the heroine begins to see clearly, which leads her to tragedy. Paratov seduces Larisa, who has already decided to marry Karandyshev. Sergei Sergeyevich publicly humiliates her fiancé. Larisa is completely disappointed in Yulia Kapitonych and says to Paratov: "I have one fiance: it's you." However, the ruined landowner-entrepreneur, although he loves the girl, has not been free in his actions for a long time. At first, he tries to assure Larisa that his passion for her was only a momentary hobby, but then he admits that he was forced to marry an unloved woman for the sake of a rich inheritance: “Paratov. ... Do you admit that a person bound hand and foot with inextricable chains can be so carried away that he forgets everything in the world, forgets the reality that oppresses him, forgets his own chains? Larisa. Well, what! And it's good that he forgets. Paratov. This state of mind is very good, I do not argue with you; but it is short lived. The frenzy of passion soon passes, leaving the chains and common sense, which says that these chains cannot be broken, that they are inseparable. Larisa (thoughtfully). Unbreakable chains! (quickly) Are you married? Paratov. No. L ar i s a. And any other chains are not a hindrance! We will carry them together, I will share this burden with you, I will take on most of the burden. Paratov. I'm engaged. Larisa. Oh! PARATOV (showing a wedding ring). These are the golden chains with which I am chained for life. Larisa. Why were you silent? Godless, godless! (Sits down on a chair.)

There are female images in Russian literature that have become the embodiment of passionate and extraordinary natures. These are Tatyana Larina and Katerina Kabanova. There are monumental images of Nekrasov: “he will stop a galloping horse, into a burning hut

come in..." There is a weak, barely blossoming flower of the “Turgenev woman”. There is, finally, Natasha Rostova - a playful child, thirsty for love. All of them are bright and memorable. And among them there is Larisa Ogudalova - "dowryless", "seagull" (before Chekhov!), A living and restless soul. She's not just a drama heroine

A. N. Ostrovsky "Dowry". She is our contemporary. Faced with a world where everything (or almost everything) is determined by money, where everything can be bought and sold, Larisa (Seagull - in Greek, and this is no coincidence) dies.

What is the reason for her death?

In a blatant discrepancy: a person has money, wealth, position in society, but no soul. He is loved by a wonderful, passionate woman (sick with her passion), sensitive, painfully expressed desire for reciprocity, - in a word, a woman with a rich, extraordinary soul, - and what does She love, he - has fun, she - burns, and he -

How could this happen? Very simple. An inexperienced girl was attracted by external brilliance, the ability to spend money “stylishly”, an abundance of all kinds of adventures, a bold appeal (without a shadow of embarrassment or admiration, as, for example, with Karandyshev), - in a word, for Larisa Paratov became an ideal thanks to the “golden” rule: “What The less we love a woman, the more she likes us.” This, of course, is not the tragedy of Larisa alone. But if a person loves like she does, with anguish, giving his soul, then such love invariably ends tragically.

Karandyshev was not and could not be a way out of the impasse: Larisa humiliated him too much, and it is impossible to accept “salvation” from him just like leaving with Knurov (one name is worth it!) To Paris.

Paratov watches the humiliating scene of the tossing game calmly, but what about the “savior”? Everyone retreated from Larisa, and death, only death is the most painless thing that can be offered. And she thanks Karandyshev for this exit, because she herself would not have decided on it.

This love could be quite happy (if it took place at all), but with one small condition: Larisa Ogudalova must be a rich bride, and she is a dowry. O. Paratov would give her everything if she had ... money! Yes, and Larisa herself would look at her chosen one differently, perhaps more soberly. Death is the natural end of such an unequal love. Seagull-Larisa dies, knowing lies and injustice, disappointment and despair. It is not for nothing that the film based on "Dowry" is called "Cruel Romance".

Reading a play, you think: “This is about us. About our day. Too many paratovs, too few laris. People have forgotten how to love, and the basis of any relationship is money. But how many destinies are distorted, how many hearts are broken! And I want to believe that the world will not be cruel to the great and selfless love as it was cruel to Larisa Ogudalova. I want to believe…