« Illness and death

Prince Andrei Bolkonsky »

(Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy, "War and Peace").

Shishkova Tatiana

school number 45

Moscow, 2000

"He was too good for this world."

Natasha Rostova

How many times have we asked ourselves why, after all, L. N. Tolstoy chose such a fate for one of his main characters in the epic novel "War and Peace", Prince Andrei Bolkonsky - to die in his thirties, when, it would seem, Is everything just beginning in life?

Maybe we should not consider the concept of death in a literal sense? Fragments of the novel speak about this and many other things, on which I would like to dwell ...

As the opening scene of change in Prince Andrei, Tolstoy begins it with “abstract”, but preparing ideas for something. As is typical for any person, before such a significant and decisive event as a battle, Prince Andrei felt "excitement and irritation." For him, it was another battle, from which he expected huge casualties and in which he had to behave with the utmost dignity as the commander of his regiment, for each soldier of which he was responsible ...

“Prince Andrei, just like all the people of the regiment, frowning and pale, walked up and down the meadow near the oat field from one boundary to the other, with his hands clasped back and his head bowed. There was nothing for him to do or order. Everything was done by itself. The dead were dragged behind the front, the wounded were carried away, the ranks closed up ... ”- Here the coldness of the description of the battle is striking. - “... At first, Prince Andrei, considering it his duty to inspire the courage of the soldiers and set an example for them, walked along the rows; but then he became convinced that he had nothing and nothing to teach them. All the strength of his soul, just like that of every soldier, was unconsciously directed towards refraining from contemplating the horror of the situation in which they were. He walked in the meadow, dragging his feet, scratching the grass and watching the dust that covered his boots; then he walked with long strides, trying to get into the tracks left by the mowers in the meadow, then, counting his steps, he made calculations how many times he had to go from boundary to boundary in order to make a verst, then he scoured the wormwood flowers growing on the boundary, and rubbed these flowers in his palms and sniffed at the fragrant, bitter, strong smell ... ”Well, is there in this passage at least a drop of the reality that Prince Andrei is about to face? He does not want, and indeed cannot think about the victims, about the “whistling of flights”, about the “rumble of shots” because this contradicts his, albeit tough, restrained, but human nature. But the present takes its toll: “Here it is ... this one is back to us! he thought, listening to the approaching whistle of something from the closed area of ​​smoke. - One, the other! Yet! Horrible…” He stopped and looked at the ranks. “No, it moved. And here it is.” And he again began to walk, trying to take long steps in order to reach the boundary in sixteen steps ... "

Perhaps this is due to excessive pride or courage, but in war a person does not want to believe that the most terrible fate that has just befallen his comrade will befall him too. Apparently, Prince Andrei belonged to such people, but the war is merciless: everyone believes in their uniqueness in the war, and she hits him indiscriminately ...

“Is this death? - thought Prince Andrei, looking with a completely new, envious look at the grass, at the wormwood and at the wisp of smoke curling from the spinning black ball. “I can’t, I don’t want to die, I love this life, I love this grass, earth, air…” He thought this and at the same time remembered that they were looking at him.

Shame on you, officer! he said to the adjutant. - What ... - he did not finish. At the same time, an explosion was heard, the whistle of fragments of a broken frame, as it were, the stuffy smell of gunpowder - and Prince Andrei rushed to the side and, raising his hand, fell on his chest ... "

At the fateful moment mortal wound Prince Andrei is experiencing the last, passionate and painful impulse to earthly life: "with a completely new, envious look" he looks "at the grass and wormwood." And then, already on a stretcher, he thinks: “Why was I so sorry to part with my life? There was something in this life that I did not understand and do not understand. Feeling the approaching end, a person wants to live his whole life in a moment, wants to know what awaits him there, at the end of it, because there is so little time left ...

Now we have a completely different Prince Andrei, and in the remaining time allotted to him, he will have to go the whole way, as if to be reborn.

Somehow, what Bolkonsky experiences after being wounded and everything that happens in reality does not fit together. The doctor is bustling around him, but it’s as if he doesn’t care, as if he no longer exists, as if there is no need to fight anymore and there is nothing for it. “The very first distant childhood was remembered by Prince Andrei, when the paramedic, with his hastily rolled up sleeves, unbuttoned his buttons and took off his dress ... After the suffering, Prince Andrei felt bliss that he had not experienced for a long time. All the best, happiest moments in his life, especially the most distant childhood, when they undressed him and put him to bed, when the nurse sang over him, lulling him to sleep, when, burying his head in the pillows, he felt happy with one consciousness of life - he introduced himself imagination, not even as past, but as reality. He experienced the best moments of his life, and what could be better than childhood memories!

Nearby, Prince Andrei saw a man who seemed very familiar to him. “Listening to his moans, Bolkonsky wanted to cry. Is it because he was dying without glory, because it was a pity for him to part with his life, or because of these irretrievable childhood memories, or because he suffered, that others suffered, and this man groaned so pitifully in front of him, but he wanted to cry childish, kind, almost joyful tears ... "

From this heartfelt passage, one can feel how strong the love for everything around Prince Andrei has become more than the struggle for life. Everything beautiful, all the memories were for him, like air, to exist in the living world, on earth ... In that familiar person, Bolkonsky recognized Anatole Kuragin - his enemy. But even here we see the rebirth of Prince Andrei: “Yes, this is him; yes, this person is somehow closely and heavily connected with me, ”thought Bolkonsky, not yet clearly understanding what was in front of him. “What is the connection of this person with my childhood, with my life?” he asked himself, finding no answer. And suddenly a new, unexpected memory from the world of childhood, pure and loving, presented itself to Prince Andrei. He remembered Natasha as he had seen her for the first time at the ball of 1810, with a thin neck and thin arms, with a frightened, happy face ready for delight, and love and tenderness for her, even more alive and stronger than ever, woke up in his mind. He remembered now the connection that existed between him and this man, through the tears that filled his swollen eyes, looking at him dully. Prince Andrei remembered everything, and enthusiastic pity and love for this man filled his happy heart ... "Natasha Rostova is another "thread" connecting Bolkonsky with the outside world, this is what he still has to live for. And why hatred, sorrow and suffering, when there is such a beautiful creature, when you can already live and be happy for this, because love is an amazingly healing feeling. In the dying prince Andrei, heaven and earth, death and life with alternating predominance, are now fighting each other. This struggle manifests itself in two forms of love: one is earthly, quivering and warm love for Natasha, for Natasha alone. And as soon as such love awakens in him, hatred for his rival Anatole flares up and Prince Andrei feels that he is unable to forgive him. The other is the ideal love for all people, chilly and extraterrestrial. As soon as this love penetrates him, the prince feels detachment from life, liberation and removal from it.

That is why we cannot predict where Prince Andrei’s thoughts will fly in the next moment: will he mourn his fading life “in an earthly way”, or will he be imbued with “enthusiastic, but not earthly” love for others.

“Prince Andrei could not resist anymore and wept tender, loving tears over people, over himself and over them and his own delusions ... “Compassion, love for brothers, for those who love, love for those who hate us, love for enemies - yes, that love that God preached on earth, which Princess Marya taught me and which I did not understand. That's why I felt sorry for life, that's what I still had left if I were alive. But now it's too late. I know it!" What an amazing, pure, inspiring feeling Prince Andrei must have experienced! But let's not forget that such a "paradise" in the soul is not at all easy for a person: only by feeling the border between life and death, only by truly appreciating life, before parting with it, can a person rise to such heights that we , mere mortals, and never dreamed of.

Now Prince Andrei has changed, which means that his attitude towards people has also changed. And how has his attitude towards the most beloved woman on earth changed? ..

Upon learning that the wounded Bolkonsky was very close, Natasha, seizing the moment, hurried to him. As Tolstoy writes, "the horror of what she would see came over her." She could not even imagine what a change she would meet in all of Prince Andrei; the main thing for her at that moment was just to see him, to be sure that he was alive ...

“He was the same as always; but the inflamed complexion of his face, the shining eyes fixed enthusiastically on her, and in particular the tender childish neck protruding from the laid back collar of his shirt, gave him a special, innocent, childish look, which, however, she had never seen in Prince Andrei. She went up to him and with a quick, flexible, young movement knelt down ... He smiled and held out his hand to her ... "

I'll take a break. All these internal and external changes make me think that a person who has acquired such spiritual values ​​and looks at the world with different eyes needs some other auxiliary, nourishing forces. “He remembered that he now had a new happiness and that this happiness had something in common with the gospel. That's why he asked for the gospel." Prince Andrei was as if under a shell from the outside world and watched him away from everyone, and at the same time his thoughts and feelings remained, so to speak, not damaged by external influences. Now he was his own guardian angel, calm, not passionately proud, but wise beyond his years. “Yes, a new happiness has opened up to me, inalienable from a person,” he thought, lying in a half-dark quiet hut and looking ahead with feverishly open, stopped eyes. Happiness that is outside of material forces, outside of material external influences on a person, the happiness of one soul, the happiness of love! .. ”And, in my opinion, it was Natasha who, with her appearance and care, partly pushed him to realize his inner wealth. She knew him like no one else (although now less) and, without noticing it herself, gave him the strength to exist on earth. If divine love was added to earthly love, then, probably, Prince Andrei began to love Natasha somehow differently, namely, more strongly. She was a link for him, she helped soften the "struggle" of his two beginnings ...

Sorry! she said in a whisper, raising her head and looking at him. - Forgive me!

I love you, - said Prince Andrei.

Sorry…

What to forgive? asked Prince Andrew.

Forgive me for what I did, - Natasha said in a barely audible, interrupted whisper and began to kiss her hand more often, slightly touching her lips.

I love you more, better than before, - said Prince Andrei, raising her face with his hand so that he could look into her eyes ...

Even Natasha's betrayal with Anatole Kuragin did not matter now: to love, to love her more than before - that was the healing power of Prince Andrei. “I experienced that feeling of love,” he says, “which is the very essence of the soul and for which no object is needed. I still have that blissful feeling. Love your neighbors, love your enemies. To love everything is to love God in all manifestations. You can love a dear person with human love; but only the enemy can be loved with divine love. And from this I experienced such joy when I felt that I love that person [Anatole Kuragin]. What about him? Is he alive ... Loving with human love, one can move from love to hatred; but divine love cannot change. Nothing, not death, nothing can destroy it…”

It seems to me that, if we forget about the physical pain from the injury, thanks to Natasha, the “illness” of Prince Andrei turned almost into paradise, to say the least, because some part of Bolkonsky’s soul was already “not with us”. Now he has found a new height, which he did not want to reveal to anyone. How is he going to live with this?

When Prince Andrei's health seemed to be recovering, the doctor was not happy about this, because he believed that either Bolkonsky would die now (which is better for him), or a month later (which would be much harder). Despite all these predictions, Prince Andrei was still fading away, but in a different way, so that no one noticed it; maybe outwardly his health was improving - inwardly he felt in himself an endless struggle. And even “when they brought Nikolushka [son] to Prince Andrei, who looked at his father in fright, but did not cry, because no one was crying, Prince Andrei ... did not know what to say to him.”

“He not only knew that he was going to die, but he felt that he was dying, that he was already half dead. He experienced the consciousness of alienation from everything earthly and the joyful and strange lightness of being. He, without haste and without anxiety, expected what lay ahead of him. That formidable, eternal, unknown, distant, the presence of which he never ceased to feel throughout his life, was now close to him and - by that strange lightness of being that he experienced - almost understandable and felt ... "

At first, Prince Andrei was afraid of death. But now he did not even understand the fear of death, because, having survived after being wounded, he realized that there was nothing terrible in the world; he began to realize that to die is only to move from one “space” to another, moreover, without losing, but gaining something more, and now the border between these two spaces began to gradually blur. Physically recovering, but internally "fading", Prince Andrei thought about death much more simply than others; it seemed to them that he no longer grieved that his son would be left without a father, that his loved ones would lose a loved one. Maybe that’s the way it is, but at that moment Bolkonsky was worried about something completely different: how to stay at the achieved height until the end of his life? And if we even envy him a little in his spiritual attainment, then how can Prince Andrei combine two principles in himself? Apparently, Prince Andrei did not know how to do this, and did not want to. Therefore, he began to give preference to the beginning of the divine ... “The further he, in those hours of suffering solitude and semi-delusion that he spent after his wound, pondered over the new beginning open to him eternal love Moreover, he himself, without feeling it, renounced earthly life. Everything, to love everyone, to always sacrifice oneself for love, meant not to love anyone, meant not to live this earthly life.

Andrei Bolkonsky has a dream. Most likely, it was he who became the culmination of his spiritual wanderings. In a dream, “it”, that is, death, does not allow Prince Andrei to close the door behind him and he dies ... “But at the same moment as he died, he remembered that he was sleeping, and at the same moment as he died, Prince Andrei, having made an effort on himself, woke up ... “Yes, it was death. I died - I woke up. Yes, death is an awakening,” his soul suddenly brightened, and the veil that had hidden the unknown until now was lifted before his spiritual gaze. He felt, as it were, the release of the previously bound strength in him and that strange lightness that has not left him since then ... ”And now the struggle ends with the victory of ideal love - Prince Andrei dies. This means that the “weightless” devotion to death turned out to be much easier for him than the combination of two principles. Self-consciousness awakened in him, he remained outside the world. Perhaps it is no coincidence that death itself as a phenomenon is almost never given a line in the novel: for Prince Andrei, death did not come unexpectedly, it did not creep up - it was he who had been waiting for her for a long time, preparing for it. The land, to which Prince Andrei passionately reached out at the fateful moment, never fell into his hands, sailed away, leaving in his soul a feeling of anxious bewilderment, an unsolved mystery.

“Natasha and Princess Marya were now also crying, but they were crying not from their own personal grief; they wept from the reverent tenderness that seized their souls before the consciousness of the simple and solemn mystery of death that took place before them.

Now, summing up everything written above, I can conclude that the spiritual quest of Prince Andrei Bolkonsky had an outcome perfectly chosen by Tolstoy: one of his favorite heroes was awarded such inner wealth that there was no other way to live with him, how to choose death (protection), and not find. The author did not wipe Prince Andrei off the face of the earth, no! He gave his hero a blessing that he could not refuse; In return, Prince Andrei left the world the ever-warming light of his love.

« Illness and death

Prince Andrei Bolkonsky»

(Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy, "War and Peace").

Shishkova Tatiana

school number 45

Moscow, 2000

"He was too good for this world."

Natasha Rostova

How many times have we asked ourselves why, after all, L. N. Tolstoy chose such a fate for one of his main characters in the epic novel "War and Peace", Prince Andrei Bolkonsky - to die in his thirties, when, it would seem, Is everything just beginning in life?

Maybe we should not consider the concept of death in a literal sense? Fragments of the novel speak about this and many other things, on which I would like to dwell ...

As the opening scene of change in Prince Andrei, Tolstoy begins it with “abstract”, but preparing ideas for something. As is typical for any person, before such a significant and decisive event as a battle, Prince Andrei felt "excitement and irritation." For him, it was another battle, from which he expected huge casualties and in which he had to behave with the utmost dignity as the commander of his regiment, for each soldier of which he was responsible ...

“Prince Andrei, just like all the people of the regiment, frowning and pale, walked up and down the meadow near the oat field from one boundary to the other, with his hands clasped back and his head bowed. There was nothing for him to do or order. Everything was done by itself. The dead were dragged behind the front, the wounded were carried away, the ranks closed up ... ”- Here the coldness of the description of the battle is striking. - “... At first, Prince Andrei, considering it his duty to inspire the courage of the soldiers and set an example for them, walked along the rows; but then he became convinced that he had nothing and nothing to teach them. All the strength of his soul, just like that of every soldier, was unconsciously directed towards refraining from contemplating the horror of the situation in which they were. He walked in the meadow, dragging his feet, scratching the grass and watching the dust that covered his boots; then he walked with long strides, trying to get into the tracks left by the mowers in the meadow, then, counting his steps, he made calculations how many times he had to go from boundary to boundary in order to make a verst, then he scoured the wormwood flowers growing on the boundary, and rubbed these flowers in his palms and sniffed at the fragrant, bitter, strong smell ... ”Well, is there in this passage at least a drop of the reality that Prince Andrei is about to face? He does not want, and indeed cannot think about the victims, about the “whistling of flights”, about the “rumble of shots” because this contradicts his, albeit tough, restrained, but human nature. But the present takes its toll: “Here it is ... this one is back to us! he thought, listening to the approaching whistle of something from the closed area of ​​smoke. - One, the other! Yet! Horrible…” He stopped and looked at the ranks. “No, it moved. And here it is.” And he again began to walk, trying to take long steps in order to reach the boundary in sixteen steps ... "

Perhaps this is due to excessive pride or courage, but in war a person does not want to believe that the most terrible fate that has just befallen his comrade will befall him too. Apparently, Prince Andrei belonged to such people, but the war is merciless: everyone believes in their uniqueness in the war, and she hits him indiscriminately ...

“Is this death? - thought Prince Andrei, looking with a completely new, envious look at the grass, at the wormwood and at the wisp of smoke curling from the spinning black ball. “I can’t, I don’t want to die, I love this life, I love this grass, earth, air…” He thought this and at the same time remembered that they were looking at him.

Shame on you, officer! he said to the adjutant. - What ... - he did not finish. At the same time, an explosion was heard, the whistle of fragments of a broken frame, as it were, the stuffy smell of gunpowder - and Prince Andrei rushed to the side and, raising his hand, fell on his chest ... "

At the fateful moment of the mortal wound, Prince Andrei experiences the last, passionate and painful impulse to earthly life: “with a completely new, envious look,” he looks “at the grass and wormwood.” And then, already on a stretcher, he thinks: “Why was I so sorry to part with my life? There was something in this life that I did not understand and do not understand. Feeling the approaching end, a person wants to live his whole life in a moment, wants to know what awaits him there, at the end of it, because there is so little time left ...

Now we have a completely different Prince Andrei, and in the remaining time allotted to him, he will have to go the whole way, as if to be reborn.

Somehow, what Bolkonsky experiences after being wounded and everything that happens in reality does not fit together. The doctor is bustling around him, but it’s as if he doesn’t care, as if he no longer exists, as if there is no need to fight anymore and there is nothing for it. “The very first distant childhood was remembered by Prince Andrei, when the paramedic, with his hastily rolled up sleeves, unbuttoned his buttons and took off his dress ... After the suffering, Prince Andrei felt bliss that he had not experienced for a long time. All the best, happiest moments in his life, especially the most distant childhood, when they undressed him and put him to bed, when the nurse sang over him, lulling him to sleep, when, burying his head in the pillows, he felt happy with one consciousness of life - he introduced himself imagination, not even as past, but as reality. He experienced the best moments of his life, and what could be better than childhood memories!

Nearby, Prince Andrei saw a man who seemed very familiar to him. “Listening to his moans, Bolkonsky wanted to cry. Is it because he was dying without glory, because it was a pity for him to part with his life, or because of these irretrievable childhood memories, or because he suffered, that others suffered, and this man groaned so pitifully in front of him, but he wanted to cry childish, kind, almost joyful tears ... "

From this heartfelt passage, one can feel how strong the love for everything around Prince Andrei has become more than the struggle for life. Everything beautiful, all the memories were for him, like air, to exist in the living world, on earth ... In that familiar person, Bolkonsky recognized Anatole Kuragin - his enemy. But even here we see the rebirth of Prince Andrei: “Yes, this is him; yes, this person is somehow closely and heavily connected with me, ”thought Bolkonsky, not yet clearly understanding what was in front of him. “What is the connection of this person with my childhood, with my life?” he asked himself, finding no answer. And suddenly a new, unexpected memory from the world of childhood, pure and loving, presented itself to Prince Andrei. He remembered Natasha as he had seen her for the first time at the ball of 1810, with a thin neck and thin arms, with a frightened, happy face ready for delight, and love and tenderness for her, even more alive and stronger than ever, woke up in his mind. He remembered now the connection that existed between him and this man, through the tears that filled his swollen eyes, looking at him dully. Prince Andrei remembered everything, and enthusiastic pity and love for this man filled his happy heart ... "Natasha Rostova is another "thread" connecting Bolkonsky with the outside world, this is what he still has to live for. And why hatred, sorrow and suffering, when there is such a beautiful creature, when you can already live and be happy for this, because love is an amazingly healing feeling. In the dying prince Andrei, heaven and earth, death and life with alternating predominance, are now fighting each other. This struggle manifests itself in two forms of love: one is earthly, quivering and warm love for Natasha, for Natasha alone. And as soon as such love awakens in him, hatred for his rival Anatole flares up and Prince Andrei feels that he is unable to forgive him. The other is the ideal love for all people, chilly and extraterrestrial. As soon as this love penetrates him, the prince feels detachment from life, liberation and removal from it.

That is why we cannot predict where Prince Andrei’s thoughts will fly in the next moment: will he mourn his fading life “in an earthly way”, or will he be imbued with “enthusiastic, but not earthly” love for others.

“Prince Andrei could not resist anymore and wept tender, loving tears over people, over himself and over them and his own delusions ... “Compassion, love for brothers, for those who love, love for those who hate us, love for enemies - yes, that love that God preached on earth, which Princess Marya taught me and which I did not understand. That's why I felt sorry for life, that's what I still had left if I were alive. But now it's too late. I know it!" What an amazing, pure, inspiring feeling Prince Andrei must have experienced! But let's not forget that such a "paradise" in the soul is not at all easy for a person: only by feeling the border between life and death, only by truly appreciating life, before parting with it, can a person rise to such heights that we , mere mortals, and never dreamed of.

Now Prince Andrei has changed, which means that his attitude towards people has also changed. And how has his attitude towards the most beloved woman on earth changed? ..

Upon learning that the wounded Bolkonsky was very close, Natasha, seizing the moment, hurried to him. As Tolstoy writes, "the horror of what she would see came over her." She could not even imagine what a change she would meet in all of Prince Andrei; the main thing for her at that moment was just to see him, to be sure that he was alive ...

“He was the same as always; but the inflamed complexion of his face, the shining eyes fixed enthusiastically on her, and in particular the tender childish neck protruding from the laid back collar of his shirt, gave him a special, innocent, childish look, which, however, she had never seen in Prince Andrei. She went up to him and with a quick, flexible, young movement knelt down ... He smiled and held out his hand to her ... "

on this topic :

« Illness and death

Prince Andrei Bolkonsky »

(Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy, "War and Peace").

Shishkova Tatiana

school number 45

10 "B"

Moscow, 2000

"He was too good for this world."

Natasha Rostova

How many times have we asked ourselves why, after all, L. N. Tolstoy chose such a fate for one of his main characters in the epic novel "War and Peace", Prince Andrei Bolkonsky - to die in his thirties, when, it would seem, Is everything just beginning in life?

Maybe we should not consider the concept of death in a literal sense? Fragments of the novel speak about this and many other things, on which I would like to dwell ...

* * *

As the opening scene of change in Prince Andrei, Tolstoy begins it with “abstract”, but preparing ideas for something. As is typical for any person, before such a significant and decisive event as a battle, Prince Andrei felt "excitement and irritation." For him, it was another battle, from which he expected huge casualties and in which he had to behave with the utmost dignity as the commander of his regiment, for each soldier of which he was responsible ...

“Prince Andrei, just like all the people of the regiment, frowning and pale, walked up and down the meadow near the oat field from one boundary to the other, with his hands clasped back and his head bowed. There was nothing for him to do or order. Everything was done by itself. The dead were dragged behind the front, the wounded were carried away, the ranks closed up ... ”- Here the coldness of the description of the battle is striking. - “... At first, Prince Andrei, considering it his duty to inspire the courage of the soldiers and set an example for them, walked along the rows; but then he became convinced that he had nothing and nothing to teach them. All the strength of his soul, just like that of every soldier, was unconsciously directed towards refraining from contemplating the horror of the situation in which they were. He walked in the meadow, dragging his feet, scratching the grass and watching the dust that covered his boots; then he walked with long strides, trying to get into the tracks left by the mowers in the meadow, then, counting his steps, he made calculations how many times he had to go from boundary to boundary in order to make a verst, then he scoured the wormwood flowers growing on the boundary, and rubbed these flowers in his palms and sniffed at the fragrant, bitter, strong smell ... ”Well, is there in this passage at least a drop of the reality that Prince Andrei is about to face? He does not want, and indeed cannot think about the victims, about the “whistling of flights”, about the “rumble of shots” because this contradicts his, albeit tough, restrained, but human nature. But the present takes its toll: “Here it is ... this one is back to us! he thought, listening to the approaching whistle of something from the closed area of ​​smoke. - One, the other! Yet! Horrible…” He stopped and looked at the ranks. “No, it moved. And here it is.” And he again began to walk, trying to take long steps in order to reach the boundary in sixteen steps ... "

Perhaps this is due to excessive pride or courage, but in war a person does not want to believe that the most terrible fate that has just befallen his comrade will befall him too. Apparently, Prince Andrei belonged to such people, but the war is merciless: everyone believes in their uniqueness in the war, and she hits him indiscriminately ...

“Is this death? - thought Prince Andrei, looking with a completely new, envious look at the grass, at the wormwood and at the wisp of smoke curling from the spinning black ball. “I can’t, I don’t want to die, I love this life, I love this grass, earth, air…” He thought this and at the same time remembered that they were looking at him.

Shame on you, officer! he said to the adjutant. - What ... - he did not finish. At the same time, an explosion was heard, the whistle of fragments of a broken frame, as it were, the stuffy smell of gunpowder - and Prince Andrei rushed to the side and, raising his hand, fell on his chest ... "

At the fateful moment of the mortal wound, Prince Andrei experiences the last, passionate and painful impulse to earthly life: “with a completely new, envious look,” he looks “at the grass and wormwood.” And then, already on a stretcher, he thinks: “Why was I so sorry to part with my life? There was something in this life that I did not understand and do not understand. Feeling the approaching end, a person wants to live his whole life in a moment, wants to know what awaits him there, at the end of it, because there is so little time left ...

Now we have a completely different Prince Andrei, and in the remaining time allotted to him, he will have to go the whole way, as if to be reborn.

* * *

Somehow, what Bolkonsky experiences after being wounded and everything that happens in reality does not fit together. The doctor is bustling around him, but it’s as if he doesn’t care, as if he no longer exists, as if there is no need to fight anymore and there is nothing for it. “The very first distant childhood was remembered by Prince Andrei, when the paramedic, with his hastily rolled up sleeves, unbuttoned his buttons and took off his dress ... After the suffering, Prince Andrei felt bliss that he had not experienced for a long time. All the best, happiest moments in his life, especially the most distant childhood, when they undressed him and put him to bed, when the nurse sang over him, lulling him to sleep, when, burying his head in the pillows, he felt happy with one consciousness of life - he introduced himself imagination, not even as past, but as reality. He experienced the best moments of his life, and what could be better than childhood memories!

Nearby, Prince Andrei saw a man who seemed very familiar to him. “Listening to his moans, Bolkonsky wanted to cry. Is it because he was dying without glory, because it was a pity for him to part with his life, or because of these irretrievable childhood memories, or because he suffered, that others suffered, and this man groaned so pitifully in front of him, but he wanted to cry childish, kind, almost joyful tears ... "

From this heartfelt passage, one can feel how strong the love for everything around Prince Andrei has become more than the struggle for life. Everything beautiful, all the memories were for him, like air, to exist in the living world, on earth ... In that familiar person, Bolkonsky recognized Anatole Kuragin - his enemy. But even here we see the rebirth of Prince Andrei: “Yes, this is him; yes, this person is somehow closely and heavily connected with me, ”thought Bolkonsky, not yet clearly understanding what was in front of him. “What is the connection of this person with my childhood, with my life?” he asked himself, finding no answer. And suddenly a new, unexpected memory from the world of childhood, pure and loving, presented itself to Prince Andrei. He remembered Natasha as he had seen her for the first time at the ball of 1810, with a thin neck and thin arms, with a frightened, happy face ready for delight, and love and tenderness for her, even more alive and stronger than ever, woke up in his mind. He remembered now the connection that existed between him and this man, through the tears that filled his swollen eyes, looking at him dully. Prince Andrei remembered everything, and enthusiastic pity and love for this man filled his happy heart ... "Natasha Rostova is another "thread" connecting Bolkonsky with the outside world, this is what he still has to live for. And why hatred, sorrow and suffering, when there is such a beautiful creature, when you can already live and be happy for this, because love is an amazingly healing feeling. In the dying prince Andrei, heaven and earth, death and life with alternating predominance, are now fighting each other. This struggle manifests itself in two forms of love: one is earthly, quivering and warm love for Natasha, for Natasha alone. And as soon as such love awakens in him, hatred for his rival Anatole flares up and Prince Andrei feels that he is unable to forgive him. The other is the ideal love for all people, chilly and extraterrestrial. As soon as this love penetrates him, the prince feels detachment from life, liberation and removal from it.

That is why we cannot predict where Prince Andrei’s thoughts will fly in the next moment: will he mourn his fading life “in an earthly way”, or will he be imbued with “enthusiastic, but not earthly” love for others.

“Prince Andrei could not resist anymore and wept tender, loving tears over people, over himself and over them and his own delusions ... “Compassion, love for brothers, for those who love, love for those who hate us, love for enemies - yes, that love that God preached on earth, which Princess Marya taught me and which I did not understand. That's why I felt sorry for life, that's what I still had left if I were alive. But now it's too late. I know it!" What an amazing, pure, inspiring feeling Prince Andrei must have experienced! But let's not forget that such a "paradise" in the soul is not at all easy for a person: only by feeling the border between life and death, only by truly appreciating life, before parting with it, can a person rise to such heights that we , mere mortals, and never dreamed of.

Now Prince Andrei has changed, which means that his attitude towards people has also changed. And how has his attitude towards the most beloved woman on earth changed? ..

* * *

Upon learning that the wounded Bolkonsky was very close, Natasha, seizing the moment, hurried to him. As Tolstoy writes, "the horror of what she would see came over her." She could not even imagine what a change she would meet in all of Prince Andrei; the main thing for her at that moment was just to see him, to be sure that he was alive ...

“He was the same as always; but the inflamed complexion of his face, the shining eyes fixed enthusiastically on her, and in particular the tender childish neck protruding from the laid back collar of his shirt, gave him a special, innocent, childish look, which, however, she had never seen in Prince Andrei. She went up to him and with a quick, flexible, young movement knelt down ... He smiled and held out his hand to her ... "

I'll take a break. All these internal and external changes make me think that a person who has acquired such spiritual values ​​and looks at the world with different eyes needs some other auxiliary, nourishing forces. “He remembered that he now had a new happiness and that this happiness had something in common with the gospel. That's why he asked for the gospel." Prince Andrei was as if under a shell from the outside world and watched him away from everyone, and at the same time his thoughts and feelings remained, so to speak, not damaged by external influences. Now he was his own guardian angel, calm, not passionately proud, but wise beyond his years. “Yes, a new happiness has opened up to me, inalienable from a person,” he thought, lying in a half-dark quiet hut and looking ahead with feverishly open, stopped eyes. Happiness that is outside of material forces, outside of material external influences on a person, the happiness of one soul, the happiness of love! .. ”And, in my opinion, it was Natasha who, with her appearance and care, partly pushed him to realize his inner wealth. She knew him like no one else (although now less) and, without noticing it herself, gave him the strength to exist on earth. If divine love was added to earthly love, then, probably, Prince Andrei began to love Natasha somehow differently, namely, more strongly. She was a link for him, she helped soften the "struggle" of his two beginnings ...

Sorry! she said in a whisper, raising her head and looking at him. - Forgive me!

I love you, - said Prince Andrei.

Sorry…

What to forgive? asked Prince Andrew.

Forgive me for what I did, - Natasha said in a barely audible, interrupted whisper and began to kiss her hand more often, slightly touching her lips.

I love you more, better than before, - said Prince Andrei, raising her face with his hand so that he could look into her eyes ...

Even Natasha's betrayal with Anatole Kuragin did not matter now: to love, to love her more than before - that was the healing power of Prince Andrei. “I experienced that feeling of love,” he says, “which is the very essence of the soul and for which no object is needed. I still have that blissful feeling. Love your neighbors, love your enemies. To love everything is to love God in all manifestations. You can love a dear person with human love; but only the enemy can be loved with divine love. And from this I experienced such joy when I felt that I love that person[Anatole Kuragin]. What about him? Is he alive ... Loving with human love, one can move from love to hatred; but divine love cannot change. Nothing, not death, nothing can destroy it…”

It seems to me that, if we forget about the physical pain from the injury, thanks to Natasha, the “illness” of Prince Andrei turned almost into paradise, to say the least, because some part of Bolkonsky’s soul was already “not with us”. Now he has found a new height, which he did not want to reveal to anyone. How is he going to live with this?

* * *

When Prince Andrei's health seemed to be recovering, the doctor was not happy about this, because he believed that either Bolkonsky would die now (which is better for him), or a month later (which would be much harder). Despite all these predictions, Prince Andrei was still fading away, but in a different way, so that no one noticed it; maybe outwardly his health was improving - inwardly he felt in himself an endless struggle. And even “when they brought Nikolushka to Prince Andrei[son], who looked frightened at his father, but did not cry, because no one was crying, Prince Andrei ... did not know what to say to him.

“He not only knew that he was going to die, but he felt that he was dying, that he was already half dead. He experienced the consciousness of alienation from everything earthly and the joyful and strange lightness of being. He, without haste and without anxiety, expected what lay ahead of him. That formidable, eternal, unknown, distant, the presence of which he never ceased to feel throughout his life, was now close to him and - by that strange lightness of being that he experienced - almost understandable and felt ... "

At first, Prince Andrei was afraid of death. But now he did not even understand the fear of death, because, having survived after being wounded, he realized that there was nothing terrible in the world; he began to realize that to die is only to move from one “space” to another, moreover, without losing, but gaining something more, and now the border between these two spaces began to gradually blur. Physically recovering, but internally "fading", Prince Andrei thought about death much more simply than others; it seemed to them that he no longer grieved that his son would be left without a father, that his loved ones would lose a loved one. Maybe that’s the way it is, but at that moment Bolkonsky was worried about something completely different: how to stay at the achieved height until the end of his life? And if we even envy him a little in his spiritual attainment, then how can Prince Andrei combine two principles in himself? Apparently, Prince Andrei did not know how to do this, and did not want to. Therefore, he began to give preference to the divine beginning ... “The further he, in those hours of suffering solitude and semi-delusion that he spent after his wound, pondered over the new beginning of eternal love opened to him, the more he, without feeling it, renounced earthly life. . Everything, to love everyone, to always sacrifice oneself for love, meant not to love anyone, meant not to live this earthly life.

Andrei Bolkonsky has a dream. Most likely, it was he who became the culmination of his spiritual wanderings. In a dream, “it”, that is, death, does not allow Prince Andrei to close the door behind him and he dies ... “But at the same moment as he died, he remembered that he was sleeping, and at the same moment as he died, Prince Andrei, having made an effort on himself, woke up ... “Yes, it was death. I died - I woke up. Yes, death is an awakening,” his soul suddenly brightened, and the veil that had hidden the unknown until now was lifted before his spiritual gaze. He felt, as it were, the release of the previously bound strength in him and that strange lightness that has not left him since then ... ”And now the struggle ends with the victory of ideal love - Prince Andrei dies. This means that the “weightless” devotion to death turned out to be much easier for him than the combination of two principles. Self-consciousness awakened in him, he remained outside the world. Perhaps it is no coincidence that death itself as a phenomenon is almost never given a line in the novel: for Prince Andrei, death did not come unexpectedly, it did not creep up - it was he who had been waiting for her for a long time, preparing for it. The land, to which Prince Andrei passionately reached out at the fateful moment, never fell into his hands, sailed away, leaving in his soul a feeling of anxious bewilderment, an unsolved mystery.

“Natasha and Princess Marya were now also crying, but they were crying not from their own personal grief; they wept from the reverent tenderness that seized their souls before the consciousness of the simple and solemn mystery of death that took place before them.

* * *

Now, summing up everything written above, I can conclude that the spiritual quest of Prince Andrei Bolkonsky had an outcome perfectly chosen by Tolstoy: one of his favorite heroes was awarded such inner wealth that there was no other way to live with him, how to choose death (protection), and not find. The author did not wipe Prince Andrei off the face of the earth, no! He gave his hero a blessing that he could not refuse; In return, Prince Andrei left the world the ever-warming light of his love.

« Illness and death

Prince Andrei Bolkonsky»

(Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy, "War and Peace").

Shishkova Tatiana

school number 45

Moscow, 2000

"He was too good for this world."

Natasha Rostova

How many times have we asked ourselves why, after all, L. N. Tolstoy chose such a fate for one of his main characters in the epic novel "War and Peace", Prince Andrei Bolkonsky - to die in his thirties, when, it would seem, Is everything just beginning in life?

Maybe we should not consider the concept of death in a literal sense? Fragments of the novel speak about this and many other things, on which I would like to dwell ...

As the opening scene of change in Prince Andrei, Tolstoy begins it with “abstract”, but preparing ideas for something. As is typical for any person, before such a significant and decisive event as a battle, Prince Andrei felt "excitement and irritation." For him, it was another battle, from which he expected huge casualties and in which he had to behave with the utmost dignity as the commander of his regiment, for each soldier of which he was responsible ...

“Prince Andrei, just like all the people of the regiment, frowning and pale, walked up and down the meadow near the oat field from one boundary to the other, with his hands clasped back and his head bowed. There was nothing for him to do or order. Everything was done by itself. The dead were dragged behind the front, the wounded were carried away, the ranks closed up ... ”- Here the coldness of the description of the battle is striking. - “... At first, Prince Andrei, considering it his duty to inspire the courage of the soldiers and set an example for them, walked along the rows; but then he became convinced that he had nothing and nothing to teach them. All the strength of his soul, just like that of every soldier, was unconsciously directed towards refraining from contemplating the horror of the situation in which they were. He walked in the meadow, dragging his feet, scratching the grass and watching the dust that covered his boots; then he walked with long strides, trying to get into the tracks left by the mowers in the meadow, then, counting his steps, he made calculations how many times he had to go from boundary to boundary in order to make a verst, then he scoured the wormwood flowers growing on the boundary, and rubbed these flowers in his palms and sniffed at the fragrant, bitter, strong smell ... ”Well, is there in this passage at least a drop of the reality that Prince Andrei is about to face? He does not want, and indeed cannot think about the victims, about the “whistling of flights”, about the “rumble of shots” because this contradicts his, albeit tough, restrained, but human nature. But the present takes its toll: “Here it is ... this one is back to us! he thought, listening to the approaching whistle of something from the closed area of ​​smoke. - One, the other! Yet! Horrible…” He stopped and looked at the ranks. “No, it moved. And here it is.” And he again began to walk, trying to take long steps in order to reach the boundary in sixteen steps ... "

Perhaps this is due to excessive pride or courage, but in war a person does not want to believe that the most terrible fate that has just befallen his comrade will befall him too. Apparently, Prince Andrei belonged to such people, but the war is merciless: everyone believes in their uniqueness in the war, and she hits him indiscriminately ...

“Is this death? - thought Prince Andrei, looking with a completely new, envious look at the grass, at the wormwood and at the wisp of smoke curling from the spinning black ball. “I can’t, I don’t want to die, I love this life, I love this grass, earth, air…” He thought this and at the same time remembered that they were looking at him.

Shame on you, officer! he said to the adjutant. - What ... - he did not finish. At the same time, an explosion was heard, the whistle of fragments of a broken frame, as it were, the stuffy smell of gunpowder - and Prince Andrei rushed to the side and, raising his hand, fell on his chest ... "

At the fateful moment of the mortal wound, Prince Andrei experiences the last, passionate and painful impulse to earthly life: “with a completely new, envious look,” he looks “at the grass and wormwood.” And then, already on a stretcher, he thinks: “Why was I so sorry to part with my life? There was something in this life that I did not understand and do not understand. Feeling the approaching end, a person wants to live his whole life in a moment, wants to know what awaits him there, at the end of it, because there is so little time left ...

Now we have a completely different Prince Andrei, and in the remaining time allotted to him, he will have to go the whole way, as if to be reborn.

Somehow, what Bolkonsky experiences after being wounded and everything that happens in reality does not fit together. The doctor is bustling around him, but it’s as if he doesn’t care, as if he no longer exists, as if there is no need to fight anymore and there is nothing for it. “The very first distant childhood was remembered by Prince Andrei, when the paramedic, with his hastily rolled up sleeves, unbuttoned his buttons and took off his dress ... After the suffering, Prince Andrei felt bliss that he had not experienced for a long time. All the best, happiest moments in his life, especially the most distant childhood, when they undressed him and put him to bed, when the nurse sang over him, lulling him to sleep, when, burying his head in the pillows, he felt happy with one consciousness of life - he introduced himself imagination, not even as past, but as reality. He experienced the best moments of his life, and what could be better than childhood memories!

Nearby, Prince Andrei saw a man who seemed very familiar to him. “Listening to his moans, Bolkonsky wanted to cry. Is it because he was dying without glory, because it was a pity for him to part with his life, or because of these irretrievable childhood memories, or because he suffered, that others suffered, and this man groaned so pitifully in front of him, but he wanted to cry childish, kind, almost joyful tears ... "

From this heartfelt passage, one can feel how strong the love for everything around Prince Andrei has become more than the struggle for life. Everything beautiful, all the memories were for him, like air, to exist in the living world, on earth ... In that familiar person, Bolkonsky recognized Anatole Kuragin - his enemy. But even here we see the rebirth of Prince Andrei: “Yes, this is him; yes, this person is somehow closely and heavily connected with me, ”thought Bolkonsky, not yet clearly understanding what was in front of him. “What is the connection of this person with my childhood, with my life?” he asked himself, finding no answer. And suddenly a new, unexpected memory from the world of childhood, pure and loving, presented itself to Prince Andrei. He remembered Natasha as he had seen her for the first time at the ball of 1810, with a thin neck and thin arms, with a frightened, happy face ready for delight, and love and tenderness for her, even more alive and stronger than ever, woke up in his mind. He remembered now the connection that existed between him and this man, through the tears that filled his swollen eyes, looking at him dully. Prince Andrei remembered everything, and enthusiastic pity and love for this man filled his happy heart ... "Natasha Rostova is another "thread" connecting Bolkonsky with the outside world, this is what he still has to live for. And why hatred, sorrow and suffering, when there is such a beautiful creature, when you can already live and be happy for this, because love is an amazingly healing feeling. In the dying prince Andrei, heaven and earth, death and life with alternating predominance, are now fighting each other. This struggle manifests itself in two forms of love: one is earthly, quivering and warm love for Natasha, for Natasha alone. And as soon as such love awakens in him, hatred for his rival Anatole flares up and Prince Andrei feels that he is unable to forgive him. The other is the ideal love for all people, chilly and extraterrestrial. As soon as this love penetrates him, the prince feels detachment from life, liberation and removal from it.

That is why we cannot predict where Prince Andrei’s thoughts will fly in the next moment: will he mourn his fading life “in an earthly way”, or will he be imbued with “enthusiastic, but not earthly” love for others.

“Prince Andrei could not resist anymore and wept tender, loving tears over people, over himself and over them and his own delusions ... “Compassion, love for brothers, for those who love, love for those who hate us, love for enemies - yes, that love that God preached on earth, which Princess Marya taught me and which I did not understand. That's why I felt sorry for life, that's what I still had left if I were alive. But now it's too late. I know it!" What an amazing, pure, inspiring feeling Prince Andrei must have experienced! But let's not forget that such a "paradise" in the soul is not at all easy for a person: only by feeling the border between life and death, only by truly appreciating life, before parting with it, can a person rise to such heights that we , mere mortals, and never dreamed of.

Now Prince Andrei has changed, which means that his attitude towards people has also changed. And how has his attitude towards the most beloved woman on earth changed? ..

Upon learning that the wounded Bolkonsky was very close, Natasha, seizing the moment, hurried to him. As Tolstoy writes, "the horror of what she would see came over her." She could not even imagine what a change she would meet in all of Prince Andrei; the main thing for her at that moment was just to see him, to be sure that he was alive ...

“He was the same as always; but the inflamed complexion of his face, the shining eyes fixed enthusiastically on her, and in particular the tender childish neck protruding from the laid back collar of his shirt, gave him a special, innocent, childish look, which, however, she had never seen in Prince Andrei. She went up to him and with a quick, flexible, young movement knelt down ... He smiled and held out his hand to her ... "

I'll take a break. All these internal and external changes make me think that a person who has acquired such spiritual values ​​and looks at the world with different eyes needs some other auxiliary, nourishing forces. “He remembered that he now had a new happiness and that this happiness had something in common with the gospel. That's why he asked for the gospel." Prince Andrei was as if under a shell from the outside world and watched him away from everyone, and at the same time his thoughts and feelings remained, so to speak, not damaged by external influences. Now he was his own guardian angel, calm, not passionately proud, but wise beyond his years. “Yes, a new happiness has opened up to me, inalienable from a person,” he thought, lying in a half-dark quiet hut and looking ahead with feverishly open, stopped eyes. Happiness that is outside of material forces, outside of material external influences on a person, the happiness of one soul, the happiness of love! .. ”And, in my opinion, it was Natasha who, with her appearance and care, partly pushed him to realize his inner wealth. She knew him like no one else (although now less) and, without noticing it herself, gave him the strength to exist on earth. If divine love was added to earthly love, then, probably, Prince Andrei began to love Natasha somehow differently, namely, more strongly. She was a link for him, she helped soften the "struggle" of his two beginnings ...

Sorry! she said in a whisper, raising her head and looking at him. - Forgive me!

I love you, - said Prince Andrei.

Sorry…

What to forgive? asked Prince Andrew.

Forgive me for what I did, - Natasha said in a barely audible, interrupted whisper and began to kiss her hand more often, slightly touching her lips.

Even Natasha's betrayal with Anatole Kuragin did not matter now: to love, to love her more than before - that was the healing power of Prince Andrei. “I experienced that feeling of love,” he says, “which is the very essence of the soul and for which no object is needed. I still have that blissful feeling. Love your neighbors, love your enemies. To love everything is to love God in all manifestations. You can love a dear person with human love; but only the enemy can be loved with divine love. And from this I experienced such joy when I felt that I love that person [Anatole Kuragin]. What about him? Is he alive ... Loving with human love, one can move from love to hatred; but divine love cannot change. Nothing, not death, nothing can destroy it…”

It seems to me that, if we forget about the physical pain from the injury, thanks to Natasha, the “illness” of Prince Andrei turned almost into paradise, to say the least, because some part of Bolkonsky’s soul was already “not with us”. Now he has found a new height, which he did not want to reveal to anyone. How is he going to live with this?

When Prince Andrei's health seemed to be recovering, the doctor was not happy about this, because he believed that either Bolkonsky would die now (which is better for him), or a month later (which would be much harder). Despite all these predictions, Prince Andrei was still fading away, but in a different way, so that no one noticed it; maybe outwardly his health was improving - inwardly he felt in himself an endless struggle. And even “when they brought Nikolushka [son] to Prince Andrei, who looked at his father in fright, but did not cry, because no one was crying, Prince Andrei ... did not know what to say to him.”

“He not only knew that he was going to die, but he felt that he was dying, that he was already half dead. He experienced the consciousness of alienation from everything earthly and the joyful and strange lightness of being. He, without haste and without anxiety, expected what lay ahead of him. That formidable, eternal, unknown, distant, the presence of which he never ceased to feel throughout his life, was now close to him and - by that strange lightness of being that he experienced - almost understandable and felt ... "

At first, Prince Andrei was afraid of death. But now he did not even understand the fear of death, because, having survived after being wounded, he realized that there was nothing terrible in the world; he began to realize that to die is only to move from one “space” to another, moreover, without losing, but gaining something more, and now the border between these two spaces began to gradually blur. Physically recovering, but internally "fading", Prince Andrei thought about death much more simply than others; it seemed to them that he no longer grieved that his son would be left without a father, that his loved ones would lose a loved one. Maybe that’s the way it is, but at that moment Bolkonsky was worried about something completely different: how to stay at the achieved height until the end of his life? And if we even envy him a little in his spiritual attainment, then how can Prince Andrei combine two principles in himself? Apparently, Prince Andrei did not know how to do this, and did not want to. Therefore, he began to give preference to the divine beginning ... “The further he, in those hours of suffering solitude and semi-delusion that he spent after his wound, pondered over the new beginning of eternal love opened to him, the more he, without feeling it, renounced earthly life. . Everything, to love everyone, to always sacrifice oneself for love, meant not to love anyone, meant not to live this earthly life.

Andrei Bolkonsky has a dream. Most likely, it was he who became the culmination of his spiritual wanderings. In a dream, “it”, that is, death, does not allow Prince Andrei to close the door behind him and he dies ... “But at the same moment as he died, he remembered that he was sleeping, and at the same moment as he died, Prince Andrei, having made an effort on himself, woke up ... “Yes, it was death. I died - I woke up. Yes, death is an awakening,” his soul suddenly brightened, and the veil that had hidden the unknown until now was lifted before his spiritual gaze. He felt, as it were, the release of the previously bound strength in him and that strange lightness that has not left him since then ... ”And now the struggle ends with the victory of ideal love - Prince Andrei dies. This means that the “weightless” devotion to death turned out to be much easier for him than the combination of two principles. Self-consciousness awakened in him, he remained outside the world. Perhaps it is no coincidence that death itself as a phenomenon is almost never given a line in the novel: for Prince Andrei, death did not come unexpectedly, it did not creep up - it was he who had been waiting for her for a long time, preparing for it. The land, to which Prince Andrei passionately reached out at the fateful moment, never fell into his hands, sailed away, leaving in his soul a feeling of anxious bewilderment, an unsolved mystery.

“Natasha and Princess Marya were now also crying, but they were crying not from their own personal grief; they wept from the reverent tenderness that seized their souls before the consciousness of the simple and solemn mystery of death that took place before them.

Now, summing up everything written above, I can conclude that the spiritual quest of Prince Andrei Bolkonsky had an outcome perfectly chosen by Tolstoy: one of his favorite heroes was awarded such inner wealth that there was no other way to live with him, how to choose death (protection), and not find. The author did not wipe Prince Andrei off the face of the earth, no! He gave his hero a blessing that he could not refuse; In return, Prince Andrei left the world the ever-warming light of his love.

?Municipal educational institution –
Medium comprehensive school № 1

(based on the novel by L. N. Tolstoy "War and Peace", analysis of the episode)

Performer: student of 11 "A" class
Pylaeva Olga
Head: teacher of Russian language and literature
Tsareva Vera Vladimirovna

Bead 2007

I Introduction. The place of the episode in the novel.
II Analysis of the episode "Wounding and death of Prince Andrei Bolkonsky":
1) Andrei Bolkonsky in the Battle of Borodino, wounded;
2) Change life position and outlook on the world;
3) The relationship between Prince Andrei and Natasha Rostova after being wounded;
4) The death of Andrei Bolkonsky.
III Conclusion.
IV Literature.

"He was too good
for this world."

Natasha Rostova

How many times have we asked ourselves why, after all, Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy chose such a fate for one of his main characters in the epic novel "War and Peace", Prince Andrei Bolkonsky - to die at the age of thirty, when, it would seem, in life this is just the beginning?
Maybe we should not consider the concept of death in a literal sense? Fragments of the novel speak about this and many other things, on which I would like to dwell ...

* * *

Then came August 26 - the day of Borodin. We see a very beautiful sight: a bright sun breaking through the fog, flashes of shots, “lightnings of morning light” on the bayonets of troops ...
The regiment of Prince Andrei stood in reserves under artillery fire, "without firing a single charge, the regiment lost another third of its people here" and many were killed earlier. The most terrible, the most bitter thing was that people were inactive: “someone with dry clay ... polished the bayonet; who kneaded the belt ... who ... changed shoes. Some built houses...or weaved wickerwork from straw...” People stood idle and were killed.

As the opening scene of change in Prince Andrei, Tolstoy begins it with “abstract”, but preparing ideas for something. As is typical for any person, before such a significant and decisive event as a battle, Prince Andrei felt "excitement and irritation." For him, it was another battle, from which he expected huge casualties and in which he had to behave with the utmost dignity as the commander of his regiment, for each soldier of which he was responsible ...

“Prince Andrei, just like all the people of the regiment, frowning and pale, walked up and down the meadow near the oat field from one boundary to the other, with his hands clasped back and his head bowed. There was nothing for him to do or order. Everything was done by itself. The dead were dragged behind the front, the wounded were carried away, the ranks closed up ... ”- Here the coldness of the description of the battle is striking. - “... At first, Prince Andrei, considering it his duty to inspire the courage of the soldiers and set an example for them, walked along the rows; but then he became convinced that he had nothing and nothing to teach them. All the strength of his soul, just like that of every soldier, was unconsciously directed towards refraining from contemplating the horror of the situation in which they were. He walked in the meadow, dragging his feet, roughening the grass and watching the dust that covered his boots; then he walked with long strides, trying to get into the tracks left by the mowers in the meadow, then, counting his steps, he made calculations how many times he had to go from boundary to boundary in order to make a verst, then he scoured the wormwood flowers growing on the boundary, and rubbed these flowers in his palms and sniffed at the fragrant, bitter, strong smell ... ”Well, is there in this passage at least a drop of the reality that Prince Andrei is about to face? He does not want, and indeed cannot think about the victims, about the “whistling of flights”, about the “rumble of shots” because this contradicts his, albeit tough, restrained, but human nature. But the present takes its toll: “Here it is ... this one is back to us! he thought, listening to the approaching whistle of something from the closed area of ​​smoke. - One, the other! Yet! Horrible…” He stopped and looked at the ranks. “No, it moved. And here it is.” And he again began to walk, trying to take long steps in order to reach the boundary in sixteen steps ... "
Perhaps this is due to excessive pride or courage, but in war a person does not want to believe that the most terrible fate that has just befallen his comrade will befall him too. Apparently, Prince Andrei belonged to such people, but war is merciless: everyone believes in their uniqueness in the war, and she hits him indiscriminately ...
When you read about how Prince Andrei was mortally wounded, you are so horrified that you forget to think about the details. And the most annoying thing is that his death seems senseless. He did not rush forward with a banner, as at Austerlitz; he was not on the battery, as at Shengraben - all his military experience and mind went to the fact that, walking around the field, counting steps and listening to the whistle of shells. In this aimless walk overtakes his enemy core.
“Lie down! - shouted the voice of the adjutant, lying on the ground. Prince Andrew stood in indecision. A grenade, like a top, smoking, spun between him and the recumbent adjutant, on the edge of arable land and meadows, near a sagebrush bush.
“Is this death? - thought Prince Andrei, looking with a completely new, envious look at the grass, at the wormwood and at the wisp of smoke curling from the spinning black ball. “I can’t, I don’t want to die, I love this life, I love this grass, earth, air…” He thought this and at the same time remembered that they were looking at him.
- Shame on you, officer! he said to the adjutant. - What ... - he did not finish. At the same time, an explosion was heard, the whistle of fragments of a broken frame, as it were, the stuffy smell of gunpowder - and Prince Andrei rushed to the side and, raising his hand, fell on his chest ... "
Why did Prince Andrei Bolkonsky die - because he did not lie down on the ground like an adjutant, but continued to stand, knowing that the core would explode? Was it really necessary to give up this wonderful life just to set an example for the soldiers?
He could not help it. He, with his sense of honor, with his noble prowess, could not lie down. There are always people who cannot run, cannot be silent, cannot hide from danger. These people are dying, but they are the best. Their death is not meaningless: it gives birth to something in the souls of other people, not defined by words, but very important.
At the fateful moment of the mortal wound, Prince Andrei experiences the last, passionate and painful impulse to earthly life: “with a completely new, envious look,” he looks “at the grass and wormwood.” And then, already on a stretcher, he thinks: “Why was I so sorry to part with my life? There was something in this life that I did not understand and do not understand. Feeling the approaching end, a person wants to live his whole life in a moment, wants to know what awaits him there, at the end of it, because there is so little time left ...
Now we have a completely different Prince Andrei, and in the remaining time allotted to him, he will have to go the whole way, as if to be reborn.

* * *
Somehow, what Bolkonsky experiences after being wounded and everything that happens in reality does not fit together. The doctor is bustling around him, but it’s as if he doesn’t care, as if he no longer exists, as if there is no need to fight anymore and there is nothing for it. “The very first distant childhood was remembered by Prince Andrei, when the paramedic, with his hastily rolled up sleeves, unbuttoned his buttons and took off his dress ... After the suffering, Prince Andrei felt bliss that he had not experienced for a long time. All the best, happiest moments in his life, especially the most distant childhood, when they undressed him and put him to bed, when the nurse sang over him, lulling him to sleep, when, burying his head in the pillows, he felt happy with one consciousness of life - he introduced himself imagination, not even as past, but as reality. He experienced the best moments of his life, and what could be better than childhood memories!
Nearby, Prince Andrei saw a man who seemed very familiar to him. “Listening to his moans, Bolkonsky wanted to cry. Is it because he was dying without glory, because it was a pity for him to part with his life, or because of these irretrievable childhood memories, or because he suffered, that others suffered, and this man groaned so pitifully in front of him, but he wanted to cry childish, kind, almost joyful tears ... "
From this heartfelt passage, one can feel how strong the love for everything around Prince Andrei has become more than the struggle for life. Everything beautiful, all the memories were for him, like air, to exist in the living world, on earth ... In that familiar person, Bolkonsky recognized Anatole Kuragin - his enemy. But even here we see the rebirth of Prince Andrei: “Yes, this is him; yes, this person is somehow closely and heavily connected with me, ”thought Bolkonsky, not yet clearly understanding what was in front of him. “What is the connection of this person with my childhood, with my life?” he asked himself, finding no answer. And suddenly a new, unexpected memory from the world of childhood, pure and loving, presented itself to Prince Andrei. He remembered Natasha as he had seen her for the first time at the ball of 1810, with a thin neck and thin arms, with a frightened, happy face ready for delight, and love and tenderness for her, even more alive and stronger than ever, woke up in his mind. He remembered now the connection that existed between him and this man, through the tears that filled his swollen eyes, looking at him dully. Prince Andrei remembered everything, and enthusiastic pity and love for this man filled his happy heart ... "Natasha Rostova is another "thread" connecting Bolkonsky with the outside world, this is what he still has to live for. And why hatred, sorrow and suffering, when there is such a beautiful creature, when you can already live and be happy for this, because love is an amazingly healing feeling. In the dying prince Andrei, heaven and earth, death and life with alternating predominance, are now fighting each other. This struggle manifests itself in two forms of love: one is earthly, quivering and warm love for Natasha, for Natasha alone. And as soon as such love awakens in him, hatred for his rival Anatole flares up and Prince Andrei feels that he is unable to forgive him. The other is the ideal love for all people, chilly and extraterrestrial. As soon as this love penetrates him, the prince feels detachment from life, liberation and removal from it.
That is why we cannot predict where Prince Andrei's thoughts will fly in the next moment: whether he will mourn his fading life in an “earthly” way, or will he be imbued with “enthusiastic, but not earthly” love for others.
“Prince Andrei could not resist anymore and wept tender, loving tears over people, over himself and over them and his own delusions ... “Compassion, love for brothers, for those who love, love for those who hate us, love for enemies - yes, that love that God preached on earth, which Princess Marya taught me and which I did not understand. That's why I felt sorry for life, that's what I still had left if I were alive. But now it's too late. I know it!" What an amazing, pure, inspiring feeling Prince Andrei must have experienced! But let's not forget that such a "paradise" in the soul is not at all easy for a person: only by feeling the border between life and death, only by truly appreciating life, before parting with it, can a person rise to such heights that we , mere mortals, and never dreamed of.
Now Prince Andrei has changed, which means that his attitude towards people has also changed. And how has his attitude towards the most beloved woman on earth changed? ..

* * *
Upon learning that the wounded Bolkonsky was very close, Natasha, seizing the moment, hurried to him. As Tolstoy writes, "the horror of what she would see came over her." She could not even imagine what a change she would meet in all of Prince Andrei; the main thing for her at that moment was just to see him, to be sure that he was alive ...
“He was the same as always; but the inflamed complexion of his face, the shining eyes fixed enthusiastically on her, and in particular the tender childish neck protruding from the laid back collar of his shirt, gave him a special, innocent, childish look, which, however, she had never seen in Prince Andrei. She went up to him and with a quick, flexible, young movement knelt down ... He smiled and held out his hand to her ... "
I'll take a break. All these internal and external changes make me think that a person who has acquired such spiritual values ​​and who looks at the world with different eyes needs some other auxiliary, nourishing forces. “He remembered that he now had a new happiness and that this happiness had something in common with the gospel. That's why he asked for the gospel." Prince Andrei was as if under a shell from the outside world and watched him away from everyone, and at the same time his thoughts and feelings remained, so to speak, not damaged by external influences. Now he was his own guardian angel, calm, not passionately proud, but wise beyond his years. “Yes, a new happiness has opened up to me, inalienable from a person,” he thought, lying in a half-dark quiet hut and looking ahead with feverishly open, stopped eyes. Happiness that is outside of material forces, outside of material external influences on a person, the happiness of one soul, the happiness of love! .. ”And, in my opinion, it was Natasha who, with her appearance and care, partly pushed him to realize his inner wealth. She knew him like no one else (although now less) and, without noticing it herself, gave him the strength to exist on earth. If divine love was added to earthly love, then, probably, Prince Andrei began to love Natasha somehow differently, namely, more strongly. She was a link for him, she helped soften the "struggle" of his two beginnings ...
- Sorry! she said in a whisper, raising her head and looking at him. - Forgive me!
“I love you,” said Prince Andrei.
- Sorry…
- Forgive what? asked Prince Andrew.
“Forgive me for what I did,” Natasha said in a barely audible, interrupted whisper and began to kiss her hand more often, slightly touching her lips.
“I love you more, better than before,” said Prince Andrei, raising her face with his hand so that he could look into her eyes ...
Even Natasha's betrayal with Anatole Kuragin did not matter now: to love, to love her more than before - that was the healing power of Prince Andrei. “I experienced that feeling of love,” he says, “which is the very essence of the soul and for which no object is needed. I still have that blissful feeling. Love your neighbors, love your enemies. To love everything is to love God in all manifestations. You can love a dear person with human love; but only the enemy can be loved with divine love. And from this I experienced such joy when I felt that I love that person [Anatole Kuragin]. What about him? Is he alive ... Loving with human love, one can move from love to hatred; but divine love cannot change. Nothing, not death, nothing can destroy it…”
It seems to me that, if we forget about the physical pain from the injury, thanks to Natasha, the “illness” of Prince Andrei turned almost into paradise, to say the least, because some part of Bolkonsky’s soul was already “not with us”. Now he has found a new height, which he did not want to reveal to anyone. How is he going to live with this?

* * *
When Prince Andrei's health seemed to be recovering, the doctor was not happy about this, because he believed that either Bolkonsky would die now (which is better for him), or a month later (which would be much harder). Despite all these predictions, Prince Andrei was still fading away, but in a different way, so that no one noticed it; maybe outwardly his health was improving - inwardly he felt in himself an endless struggle. And even “when they brought Nikolushka [son] to Prince Andrei, who looked at his father in fright, but did not cry, because no one was crying, Prince Andrei ... did not know what to say to him.”
“He not only knew that he was going to die, but he felt that he was dying, that he was already half dead. He experienced the consciousness of alienation from everything earthly and the joyful and strange lightness of being. He, without haste and without anxiety, expected what lay ahead of him. That formidable, eternal, unknown, distant, the presence of which he never ceased to feel throughout his life, was now close to him and - by that strange lightness of being that he experienced - almost understandable and felt ... "
At first, Prince Andrei was afraid of death. But now he did not even understand the fear of death, because, having survived after being wounded, he realized that there was nothing terrible in the world; he began to realize that to die is only to move from one “space” to another, moreover, without losing, but gaining something more, and now the border between these two spaces began to gradually blur. Physically recovering, but internally "fading", Prince Andrei thought about death much more simply than others;
etc.................