1At the beginning of the 8th century, Peter I (1682~ 1725) carried out reforms, built the army in the way of developed countries in Europe, and unified the territory of the country. He regained the Baltic Sea estuary from the Swedes, which opened the way for further learning civilization from Western Europe. The reform of Peter I played an important role in the establishment and consolidation of the Russian nation-state. But his reform was carried out by fostering emerging aristocratic landlords and businessmen and strengthening feudal serfdom. During the 30 years after Peter's death, the court coup continued, and the aristocratic landlords consolidated their dominant position in the coup.
Peter I advocated science, simplified Russian letters, published newspapers, established public theaters, and encouraged the translation and introduction of Western European works. He enforced French etiquette in court, imitated French fashion and advocated conversation in French. All his cultural efforts have greatly promoted the development of Russian cultural education, but on the one hand, he blindly worships foreign things and neglects national culture, which has a certain negative impact.
During the period of Peter I, Russian literature was still in the transition stage from ancient literature to new content and form. During the 1930s and 1950s, the autocratic system was increasingly consolidated, and the influence of French classicism went deep into Russia. As a result, the Russian classicism school was formed, and the first Russian writers such as Kantemir (1708~ 1744), lomonosov and Su marov (17 18~ 1777) appeared.
Russian classicism reflects the world outlook of advanced aristocrats and their requirements for cultural life. Besides observing the principles and formal rules of classicism, it also has its own characteristics. In order to create national literature, Russian classical writers mostly draw lessons from national history and life, pay special attention to the reform of literary language and poetic style, and emphasize the enlightenment of patriotism and scientific culture. In addition, social contradictions deepened during this period, and the French Enlightenment began to spread to Russia. Russian classical writers pay more attention to the social function of literature and often use satirical genre to express their social views.
1In the first half of the 8th century, the most important Russian writer was Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov (171~1765). He is a famous scholar in Russian history, born in a peasant family, graduated from the Slavic Greek Latin Institute, later studied in a university affiliated to the Academy of Sciences, and was sent abroad to study natural science. 174 1 After returning to China, he worked in the Academy of Sciences and founded Moscow University (1755). While carrying out scientific activities, he also engaged in language research and literary creation, wrote hymns, epics, tragedies, satires and essays, and translated Greek literary works.
Lomonosov has made great contributions to purifying Russian language and making literary language close to Japanese, including rhetoric (1744), Russian grammar (1757) and on the benefits of Russian religious books (1757). He believes that Russian is a rich, flexible, vivid and powerful language, which also has the advantages of other European languages. Since the reform of Peter I, due to the social, political and economic changes, Russian has been mixed with many foreign words, and the Slavic language of the old church has not been cleaned up. In view of this situation, he put forward reform suggestions. According to the principle of classicism, he divided the literary genres into three types: high, medium and low, stipulated the vocabulary allowed by each genre, and advocated avoiding the use of Slavic vocabulary of the old church and unnecessary foreign words. This laid the foundation for overcoming the mixed phenomenon of Russian at that time and creating a unified and standardized language.
Lomonosov's achievements in literary creation are mainly poetry. His poems praise the hero's achievements and are full of love for the motherland. He believes that the main task of poetry is not to praise wine and love, but to cultivate lofty patriotism. This view is clearly reflected in his ode. "Ode to Queen Elizabeth's Ascension Day" (1747) is actually a tribute to the motherland and Peter I. The poet takes Peter I as an example and hopes that Queen Elizabeth will inherit her father's footsteps, develop resources, develop science and train talents, and make Russia embark on the road of prosperity. He appealed to the younger generation to believe that "Russian land can produce its own Plato and Newton with extraordinary wisdom". He also wrote some magnificent scientific poems in the ode genre, explaining natural phenomena (thinking about the greatness of the sky in the morning, thinking about the greatness of the sky at night and so on). ). On the basis of the study of the contemporary poet Teregakovsky (1703~ 1769), he put forward the Russian theory of emphasizing poetic style (in The Complete Book of Russian Poetry Law, 1738), and made a successful experiment in his creation. His poems are sonorous, solemn, eloquent and full of rhythm.
18 In the 1960s, social contradictions in Russia intensified. Under the protection of the czar, the landlord enjoyed the absolute right to dominate the serfs. As the folk song "The Servant's Cry" said at that time, "A Lord killing a slave is like killing a horse, and serfs are not allowed to sue." The peasant movement continued to rise, and the peasant uprising led by pugachev broke out in the 1970s. This large-scale uprising dealt a heavy blow to the rule of landlords and nobles, which was the initial manifestation of the Russian serfdom crisis.
During this period, under the influence of the peasant movement, he developed a progressive thought against serfdom and fought fiercely with the feudal ruling class. Queen Catherine II (1762~ 1796) pretended to accept enlightenment, flaunted the "enlightened monarchy" system, advocated literary creation, published magazines and wrote in person, with the aim of making literature serve her reactionary rule. However, progressive writers such as Novikov, Feng Weixin and Radishev. In their works, this kind of "answer in skirt" is thoroughly exposed, which reflects some voices of farmers. On the eve of the Pugachev uprising, Novikov (1744~ 18 18) founded unmanned aerial vehicles (1769~ 1770) and painters (1772 ~ 65430). The name "unmanned aerial vehicle" is given to the ruling class who get something for nothing. Novikov publicly opposed the idea that Catherine II satirized with drones. He believes that satire should not be "smiling" satire, but "biting"; It should not be abstract and general, but concrete, and ruthlessly expose the specific ugly phenomenon of quasi-society. His views on irony had a good influence at that time. Feng Weixin's comedy "Dude" and Radishev's essay "Travel from Petersburg to Moscow" carry forward this ironic tradition of attaching importance to the fundamental problems of society. The poet Jerchavin (1743~ 18 16) also applied the technique of ridicule to the style of poem guidance in his Felicia (1783), blending the praise of Catherine II's "virtue" with the satire of dissolute and shameless courtiers.
Genese Ivanovich Feng Weixin (1745~ 1792) is a representative figure of Russian satirical literature in the second half of the 8th century. He was born in a noble family, studied at Moscow University, later worked as a translator in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, worked as a secretary of powerful people, and traveled to many countries in Western Europe. In his early poems, he sharply accused the czar of tyranny. He has written satires of various genres; Among them, comedy is the most successful.
Commodore (1766) laughed at the ignorance of the older generation of nobles and the poison of foreign education to the younger generation. Feng Weixin's most famous comedy is dude (1782). The landlady Prostakova abused Sophia, who was an orphan and was fostered at home in various ways. Later, because Sophia could inherit a fortune from her uncle Starodon, Prostakova forced her to be her daughter-in-law. But Sophia finally married Milan, an aristocratic officer, under the protection of enlightened nobles Pravdin and Starodon. Prostakova was brought to justice for abusing farmers and orphans, and her property was entrusted to the authorities.
The author truly depicts the image of Prostakova as a serf-owner. She is violent, treacherous, stupid and vicious. She exploited serfs, and the nanny from serfdom worked in her house for 40 years. The reward was "5 rubles a year, plus 5 slaps every day." She mistreats everyone around her, including her husband, but dotes on her son Mitrofen, hoping that he can marry Sophia, who has become a rich man. Under the education of his mother, Mitrofang is a dude who only eats, drinks and plays. He 16 years old, studied for three years, but he can't add, subtract, multiply and divide. He used his mother's doting to play truant and play tricks on his servants. He is good at have it both ways, as fierce and cunning as Prostakova ("Mitrofang", meaning "like mother" in Greek). The positive characters in the play, such as Starodon and Pravdin, are all unsuccessful. The structure of comedy is concise and compact, and it is written according to the three principles of classicism.
Alexander nikolayevich Radishev (1749~ 1802) was born in an aristocratic family and studied in Germany in his youth. Influenced by French enlightenment scholars Rousseau and Marbury, he became a materialist with democratic thoughts. After returning to China, Pougatcheff's uprising and the bloody suppression of the government made him realize the reactionary nature of the czar's rule, and re-evaluated the opinions of French enlightenment thinkers with a critical eye. Russia's repeated foreign wars, successive years of famine and the outbreak of the American-French revolution have also prompted him to consider Russia's reality and future. He has written philosophical works, political papers and literary works, the most important of which is a trip from Petersburg to Moscow (1790). Immediately after the publication of this book, he was arrested, sentenced to death, and later exiled to Siberia for hard labor, and was not recalled until his later years. 180 1 year participated in the work of the government law editorial Committee. The next year, he committed suicide to protest against the new persecution of the czar.
Soon after the publication of Travel Notes, it spread to the palace. In a rage, Catherine II criticized the contents of the book: Radishev "pinned her hopes on the peasant uprising" and "was worse than pugachev".
This work has been banned in Russia, but it is still circulated in various places in the form of manuscript, which has had a great influence on December Party members and Pushkin.
After the Pugachev Uprising, sentimental literature also appeared in Russia. Russian sentimentalism is the manifestation of the spiritual crisis of the aristocratic landlord class. Although it promoted the prosperity of Russian prose and enriched the skills of literary language and psychological description, its works beautified aristocratic landlords and attempted to cover up the antagonistic relationship between landlords and serfs, but it also had its negative side.
Karamsin (1766~ 1826) is the representative of this school. His novella "Poor Lisa" (1792) tells the story of a rural girl named Lisa who was abandoned and even committed suicide by the aristocratic master Erast. The author sympathizes with Lisa's misfortune and vividly writes about her psychological activities. However, from the standpoint of aristocrats, he defended Erast with "fate" and tried his best to obliterate the social causes of Lisa's tragedy.
/kloc-although the achievements of Russian literature in the 0/8th century are far from those of western European countries at that time, they are still a great progress for Russia itself. It prepared for the great leap forward of Russian literature in the19th century ideologically and artistically.