Alexander Green
gold chain
“The wind was blowing...” - having written this, I knocked over the inkwell with a careless movement, and the color of the shiny puddle reminded me of the darkness of that night when I lay in the cockpit of the Espanyola. This boat could barely lift six tons, and it carried a shipment of dried fish from Mazabu. Some people like the smell of dried fish.
The whole ship smelled of horror, and, lying alone in the cockpit with the window covered with a rag, by the light of a candle stolen from skipper Gros, I was busy examining the binding of a book, the pages of which had been torn out by some practical reader, and I found the binding.
On inside written on the cover in red ink:
Below it was:
"Dick Farmeron. Love you, Greta. Your D."
On the right side, a man who went by the name Lazarus Norman signed his name twenty-four times with ponytails and all-encompassing flourishes. Someone else decisively crossed out Norman’s handwriting and left the mysterious words at the very bottom: “What do we know about ourselves?”
I re-read these words with sadness. I was sixteen years old, but I already knew how painfully a bee stings - Sadness. The inscription was especially tormented by the fact that recently the guys from Meluzina, having given me a special cocktail, ruined my skin right hand, having tattooed three words: “I know everything.” They made fun of me for reading books - I read a lot of books and could answer questions that had never occurred to them.
I rolled up my sleeve. The swollen skin around the fresh tattoo was pink. I wondered if these words “I know everything” were really so stupid; then he became amused and began to laugh - he realized that they were stupid. Lowering my sleeve, I pulled out the rag and looked through the hole.
It seemed as if the lights of the harbor were shuddering right in front of my face. The rain, sharp as clicks, hit my face. The water fussed in the darkness, the wind creaked and howled, rocking the ship. “Melusina” stood nearby; there my tormentors, with the cabin brightly lit, warmed themselves with vodka. I heard what they were saying and began to listen more carefully, as the conversation was about some house with pure silver floors, about fabulous luxury, underground passages and much more. I distinguished the voices of Patrick and Mools, two ferocious red-haired scarecrows.
Mools said:
- He found a treasure.
“No,” Patrick objected. – He lived in a room where there was a secret drawer; There was a letter in the box, and from the letter he found out where the diamond mine was.
“And I heard,” said the lazy man who stole the folding knife Carrel Gooseneck from me, “that he won a million every day at cards!”
“And I think that he sold his soul to the devil,” said Bolinas, the cook, “otherwise you won’t be able to build palaces right away.”
– Should I ask “Head with a Hole”? - Patrick asked (that was the nickname they gave me), - from Sandy Pruehl, who knows everything?
Vile - oh, so vile! – laughter was Patrick’s answer. I stopped listening. I lay down again, covering myself with a torn jacket, and began to smoke tobacco collected from cigarette butts in the harbor. It produced a strong effect - as if a saw was turning in the throat. I warmed my cold nose by blowing smoke through my nostrils.
I should have been on deck: the second sailor of the Hispaniola had gone to his mistress, and the skipper and his brother were sitting in the tavern, but it was cold and disgusting above. Our cockpit was a simple plank hole with two decks of bare boards and a herring barrel-table. I was thinking about beautiful rooms Where it’s warm, there are no fleas. Then I thought about the conversation I had just heard. He alarmed me, just as you would be alarmed if they told you that a firebird had landed in a neighboring garden or that an old tree stump had bloomed with roses.
Not knowing who they were talking about, I imagined a man in blue glasses, with a pale, malicious mouth and large ears, descending from a steep peak along chests bound with gold fasteners.
“Why is he so lucky,” I thought, “why?...” Here, holding my hand in my pocket, I felt for a piece of paper and, having examined it, saw that this piece of paper represented an exact account of my relationship with the skipper - from October 17, when I entered Espanyola - until November 17, that is, until yesterday. I myself wrote down all the deductions from my salary on it. Mentioned here were: a broken cup with a blue inscription “To my dear husband from a faithful wife”; a sunken oak bucket, which I myself, at the request of the skipper, stole from the deck of the Western Grain; someone stole a yellow rubber raincoat from me, the skipper’s mouthpiece was crushed by my foot, and the glass of the cabin was broken—all by me. The skipper accurately reported each time that the next adventure was on the way, and it was useless to bargain with him, because he was quick with his hands.
I calculated the amount and saw that it more than covered the salary. I didn't have to get anything. I almost cried with anger, but I held back, because for some time I had been persistently deciding the question - “Who am I - a boy or a man?” I shuddered at the thought of being a boy, but, on the other hand, I felt something irrevocable in the word “man” - I imagined boots and a mustache like a brush. If I am a boy, as a lively girl with a basket of melons once called me - she said: “Come on, step aside, boy,” - then why do I think about everything big: books, for example, and about the position of captain, family, children, about how to say in a deep voice: “Hey you, shark meat!” If I am a man, what made me think more than anyone else was a ragged man of about seven who said, standing on his toes: “Let me light a cigarette, uncle!” - then why don’t I have a mustache and women always turn their backs to me, as if I’m not a person, but a pillar?
It was hard, cold, uncomfortable for me. The wind howled. - “Howl!” - I said, and he howled, as if he found strength in my melancholy. The rain was falling. - “Lei!” - I said, rejoicing that everything was bad, everything was damp and gloomy, - not only my score with the skipper. It was cold, and I believed that I would catch a cold and die, my restless body...
I jumped up when I heard footsteps and voices from above; but those were not our voices. The deck of the Hispaniola was lower than the embankment, so it was possible to descend onto it without a gangplank. The voice said, “There is no one in this pig trough.” I liked this start and was looking forward to the answer. “It doesn’t matter,” answered the second voice, so casual and gentle that I wondered if it was a woman answering a man. - “Well, who’s there?!” - the first one said louder, - there is light in the cockpit; hey, well done!”
Then I got out and saw - rather, distinguished in the darkness - two people wrapped in waterproof raincoats. They stood looking around, then they noticed me, and the taller one said:
- Boy, where is the skipper?
It seemed strange to me that in such darkness one could determine age. At that moment I wanted to be a skipper. I would say—thickly, thickly, hoarsely—something desperate, for example: “Tear the hell out of you!” - or: “Let all the cables in my brain break if I understand anything!”
I explained that I was the only one on the ship, and also explained where the others had gone.
“In that case,” said the tall man’s companion, “shouldn’t we go down to the cockpit?” Hey, cabin boy, sit us down and we’ll talk, it’s very damp here.
I thought... No, I didn't think anything. But it was a strange appearance, and, looking at the unknown, I flew for a moment to the beloved land of battles, heroes, treasures, where giant sails pass like shadows and a cry - a song - a whisper is heard: “Mystery - charm! Mystery is charm! “Has it really begun?” - I asked myself; my knees were shaking.
There are moments when, thinking, you don’t notice movements, so I woke up only when I saw myself sitting in the cockpit opposite the visitors - they sat on the second bunk where Egva, another sailor, was sleeping - and sat bent over so as not to hit the deck ceiling.
“These are the people!” – I thought, respectfully examining the figures of my guests. I liked both of them - each in its own way. The eldest, broad-faced, with a pale face, stern gray eyes and a barely noticeable smile, should, in my opinion, be suitable for the role of a brave captain who has something for the sailors' lunch, except dried fish. The younger one, whose voice seemed feminine to me - alas! – had a small mustache, dark disdainful eyes and blond hair. He looked weaker than the first, but he had his arms akimbo well and had a great laugh. Both sat in raincoats; The high boots with patent leather cuffs had a thin welt that shone, which means these people had money.
- Let's talk, young friend! - said the elder. – As you can see, we are not scammers.
- I swear by thunder! – I answered. - Well, let's talk, damn it!..
Then both swayed, as if a log had been placed between them, and began to laugh. I know that laugh. It means that either you are considered a fool, or you have said immeasurable nonsense. For some time I looked offended, not understanding what was the matter, then I demanded an explanation in a form sufficient to stop the fun and make my offense felt.
“Well,” said the first, “we don’t want to offend you.” We laughed because we had drunk a little. “And he told me what business brought them to the ship, and I, listening, widened my eyes.
The work "The Golden Chain" tells the story of a young sailor Sandy, who is approached by two strangers asking to borrow a ship for the night. Sandy decides to go with them. Along the way, the strangers gain confidence in Sandy and invite him to go with them to Hanover's house. There he is taken luxurious room in an equally luxurious castle. Sandy decides to take a walk around the castle and finds a secret door through which he goes out into the corridor, where he sees Dige in the company of Galway. Having overheard their conversation, he learns that Dige wants to marry Hanouver, then kill him to get everything his inheritance. Sandy tells everything to his companions, Pop and Dorok. They tell him that their goal is to return to the house of Molly, Hanover’s true lover. They find her with great difficulty, they have nowhere to go, they must find her before midnight, otherwise Dige will carry out his insidious plan. And at midnight Hanover opens the curtain where, among the large fountains, he sees Molly in a white dress. He decides to forgive the deceivers, and after a while it happens to him heart attack.Sandy becomes captain of the ship, then finds out that Hanover died, and Molly and Durocam got married. Their daughter was also named Molly, whom he later married.
Sandy works as a sailor. He tries to seem like a smart and wise sailor. One day, two strangers ask him to lend them a boat. Sandy, as an experienced sailor, wanted to go with them. Along the way, all three of them became very close. The two strangers began to trust the young sailor. The stranger needs to go to a certain Ganuver. They invite Sandy to come with them. He doesn't refuse.
At Hanover, Sendy sees such luxury that he has never encountered in his life. He is given one of the luxurious rooms. Curious Sandy cannot sit in the room. He finds a secret door and goes out into the corridor. There are two people talking. The sailor accidentally overhears them. It turns out that a girl named Dige has insidious plans for Hanover. She wants to marry him and then kill her husband. This way she will become a very rich widow. Sandy tells his companions about the unpleasant news. They answer that they must find Molly, who is Hanover’s true lover.
The poor guys barely find Molly until midnight. Hanover is saved. He forgives his enemies. Hanover soon has a heart attack. He is dying. His wife Molly and one of Sendy's unfamiliar companions, Dorok, are getting married. They have a daughter. Her name, like her mother's, is Molly. She becomes Sandy's wife. After saving Hanover's life, Sendy became captain of the ship.
Sandy the sailor. He sets sail with two strangers. He manages to save one rich man. After this, Sandy becomes the captain of the ship. He marries the daughter of a rich man's wife.
Good deeds always return to the person who did them. Everyone gets what they deserve.
Sandy works as a sailor. He tries to seem like a smart and wise sailor. One day, two strangers ask him to lend them a boat. Sandy, as an experienced sailor, wanted to go with them. Along the way, all three of them became very close. The two strangers began to trust the young sailor. The stranger needs to go to a certain Ganuver. They invite Sandy to come with them. He doesn't refuse.
At Hanover, Sendy sees such luxury that he has never encountered in his life. He is given one of the luxurious rooms. Curious Sandy cannot sit in the room. He finds a secret door and goes out into the corridor. There are two people talking. The sailor accidentally overhears them. It turns out that a girl named Dige has insidious plans for Hanover. She wants to marry him and then kill her husband. This way she will become a very rich widow. Sandy tells his companions about the unpleasant news. They answer that they must find Molly, who is Hanover’s true lover.
The poor guys barely find Molly until midnight. Hanover is saved. He forgives his enemies. Hanover soon has a heart attack. He is dying. His wife Molly and one of Sendy's unfamiliar companions, Dorok, are getting married. They have a daughter. Her name, like her mother's, is Molly. She becomes Sandy's wife. After saving Hanover's life, Sendy became captain of the ship.
A young man named Gary Engstrom has had the funny nickname Rabbit since childhood. Outwardly, it somewhat resembles this animal. The rabbit at school was considered the best basketball player and therefore cannot pass by the children
From the first lines of the story, the image of the main character emerges before us. He is a disheveled, skinny, barefoot, long-unkempt man of short stature.
Although the fairy tale The Enchanted Castle was written for children, it carries great meaning and subtext. This tale tells about three children
The Peter and Paul Fortress was notified in 1828 by a cannon shot that a peace treaty had been concluded between Russia and Persia. The Treaty on Ending the War and Peace was brought by Advisor Griboyedov
I was suffering from a strong fever. Only my servant looked after me. A servant broke into this abandoned castle and dragged me, wounded by bandits, so that I would not freeze to death on the street. We chose one of the small dark rooms for temporary accommodation.
“The wind was blowing...”, having written this, I knocked over the inkwell with a careless movement, and the color of the shiny puddle reminded me of the darkness of that night when I lay in the cockpit of the Hispaniola. This boat could barely lift six tons, and it carried a shipment of dried fish from Mazabu. Some people like the smell of dried fish.
The whole ship smelled of horror, and, lying alone in the cockpit with the window covered with a rag, by the light of a candle stolen from skipper Gros, I was busy examining the binding of a book, the pages of which had been torn out by some practical reader, and I found the binding.
On the inside of the binding was written in red ink: "It is doubtful that clever man I started reading a book that was full of fiction.”
Below it was: "Dick Farmeron. Love you, Greta. Your D." On the right side, a man who went by the name Lazarus Norman signed his name twenty-four times with ponytails and all-encompassing flourishes. Someone else decisively crossed out Norman’s handwriting and left the mysterious words at the very bottom: “What do we know about ourselves?”
I re-read these words with sadness. I was sixteen years old, but I already knew how painfully a bee stings - Sadness. The inscription was especially tormented by the fact that recently the guys from Meluzina, having given me a special cocktail, ruined the skin on my right hand, pricking out a tattoo in the form of three words: “I know everything.” They made fun of me for reading books - I read a lot of books and could answer questions that had never occurred to them.
I rolled up my sleeve. The swollen skin around the fresh tattoo was pink. I wondered if these words “I know everything” were really so stupid; then he became amused and began to laugh - he realized that they were stupid. Lowering my sleeve, I pulled out the rag and looked through the hole.
It seemed as if the lights of the harbor were shuddering right in front of my face. The rain, sharp as clicks, hit my face. The water fussed in the darkness, the wind creaked and howled, rocking the ship. "Melusina" stood nearby; there my tormentors, with the cabin brightly lit, warmed themselves with vodka. I heard what they were saying and began to listen more carefully, as the conversation was about some house with pure silver floors, about fabulous luxury, underground passages and much more. I distinguished the voices of Patrick and Mools, two ferocious red-haired scarecrows.
Mools said: “He found a treasure.”
No,” Patrick objected. - He lived in a room where there was a secret drawer; There was a letter in the box, and from the letter he found out where the diamond mine was.
“And I heard,” said the lazy man who stole the Carrel-Gooseneck folding knife from me, “that he won a million every day at cards!”
“But I think that he sold his soul to the devil,” said Bolinas, the cook, “otherwise you won’t be able to build palaces right away.”
Should I ask "Head with a Hole"? - asked Patrick (that was the nickname they gave me) - from Sandy Pruehl, who knows everything? Vile - oh, so vile! - laughter was Patrick's answer. I stopped listening. I lay down again, covering myself with a torn jacket, and began to smoke tobacco collected from cigarette butts in the harbor. It produced a strong effect - it was as if a saw was turning in the throat. I warmed my cold nose by blowing smoke through my nostrils.
I should have been on deck: the second sailor of the Hispaniola had gone to his mistress, and the skipper and his brother were sitting in the tavern, but it was cold and disgusting above. Our cockpit was a simple plank hole with two decks of bare boards and a herring barrel-table. I thought about beautiful rooms where it was warm and free of fleas. Then I thought about the conversation I had just heard. He alarmed me, just as you would be alarmed if they told you that a firebird had landed in a neighboring garden or that an old tree stump had bloomed with roses. Not knowing who they were talking about, I imagined a man in blue glasses, with a pale, malicious mouth and large ears, descending from a steep peak along chests bound with gold fasteners.
“Why is he so lucky,” I thought, “why?..”
Here, with my hand in my pocket, I felt for a piece of paper and, having examined it, saw that this piece of paper represented an exact account of my relationship with the skipper - from October 17, when I joined the Epagnola - to November 17, that is, to yesterday. I myself wrote down all the deductions from my salary on it. Mention was made here of a broken cup with a blue inscription “To my dear husband from a faithful wife”; a sunken oak bucket, which I myself, at the request of the skipper, stole from the deck of the Western Grain; someone stole a yellow rubber raincoat from me, the skipper's cigarette holder was crushed by my foot, and the glass of the cabin was broken - all by me. The skipper accurately reported every time that another adventure was on the way, and it was useless to bargain with him, because he was quick with his hands.
I calculated the amount and saw that it more than covered the salary. I didn't have to get anything. I almost cried with anger, but I held back, because for some time I had been persistently deciding the question - “Who am I - a boy or a man?” I shuddered at the thought of being a boy, but, on the other hand, I felt something irrevocable in the word “to men—I imagined boots and a brush mustache. If I am a boy, as the lively girl with a basket of melons once called me,” she said: “Come on, step aside, boy,” then why do I think about everything big: books, for example, and about the position of captain, family, children, about how to say in a deep voice: “Hey you, shark meat If!” I’m a man, - what made me think more than anyone else was a ragged man of about seven who said, standing on his tiptoes: “Let me light a cigarette, uncle!” Why don’t I have a mustache and women always stand with their backs to me, as if I were me? not a person, but a pillar?
It was hard, cold, uncomfortable for me. The wind howled - "Howl!" - I said, and he howled, as if he found strength in my melancholy. The rain was falling. - "Lei!" - I said, rejoicing that everything was bad, everything was damp and gloomy, - not only my score with the skipper. It was cold, and I believed that I would catch a cold and die, my restless body...
The pages of Alexander Green's biography in the 1920s report the writer's difficult financial condition. The dreaminess, romanticism of his characters, the separation from the pressing problems of our time, the ornateness of the author's style, all this affected the fact that the writer was not understood and was not published. However, Green continued to be true to his beliefs and style, saying that his fast-paced era did not need him like that, but he did not want to be and could not be anything else. After publishing his first Symbolist novel, The Blazing World, in 1924, Greene's confidence in own strength increases, and one after another new works are born, taking the reader with them into the world of dangerous adventures and heroes who, having followed their dreams, become happy.
Critics consider the novel “The Golden Chain,” written in 1925 in Feodosia, to be one of the most mysterious works of Alexander Greene of this period. The author himself described his creative idea as follows: the story of a boy who was looking for miracles and found them.
In the novel “The Golden Chain” the author has thought out everything to the smallest detail, every detail appears in the work to reveal the ideological and semantic load or create the individual character of the hero. The system of characters in the novel is quite multifaceted, among which several groups can be distinguished: sailors, palace inhabitants, intriguers and leading characters.
The main characters of the work are Sandro, Duroc, Estamp, Hanover and Molly. Alexander Green's novel "The Golden Chain" is quite controversial and mysterious, and the question of the main character is no exception. Without a doubt, every reader will identify Sandro as the main character. However, some critics, despite the high semantic and eventual load of this character, consider him minor character, and the main one is determined by Hanover. However, this is only one version. Indeed, all intrigues and events revolve around Hanover. But the development and formation of personality, the disclosure inner world and aspirations, changing reality through his actions, that is, all those traits that define the main character are inherent in Sandro.
All storyline The novel is accompanied by the image of Sandro, on whose behalf the story is told, and we see all the events of the work through his eyes. The young man is the main character of all the turning points of the plot. It is he who learns the secret of how Ganuver got rich, and also reveals the conspiracy of Diguet and Galway.
At the beginning of the work we have a 16-year-old sailor, a little unsure of himself. He is trying to understand who he is: a boy or a man. He gets terribly upset and flares up when he is not taken seriously. To appear older, Sandro expresses himself demonstrably swear words. However, his pompously “adult” behavior causes only laughter among those around him. Courage to risky behavior, an ardent desire to help others, attempts to correct the situation and empathy for someone else's love turn a clumsy youth into a mature and responsible man. After all, by helping others, he managed to overcome his vulnerability and resentment, to become wiser and stronger in spirit.
The most controversial image in the novel is Everest Hanover, who is the personification of the ideal hero - rich, but not having lost his humanity. At the age of 28, he becomes a living legend who managed to make an extraordinary dream come true, into a castle in the air and a real magnificent palace. In the abyss of greedy conspiracies, having lost a loved one, he begins to drink and lose heart. However, he never loses his main gift - the ability to love.
The affirmation of the romantic ideal of the victory of good over evil is impossible without the support of faithful and devoted friends, who are embodied in the novel by Duroc, Estamp, and the librarian Pop.
The basis of the work’s problematics are the eternal contradictions between dreams and harmony, wealth and simple human happiness. Courage and the romantic pursuit of a dream are beautiful. However, there is a certain fee for everything. The owner of the golden chain, having received everything he could want, was left alone in a huge and crowded house. He became a prisoner of his golden chain. And those to whom he tried to open his suffering heart turned out to be greedy hunters for wealth. Beloved girl Molly tries to save Hanover from her insatiable brothers at the cost of her own happiness. Thus, Alexander Green asserts in the novel the true human virtues - honesty, incorruptibility and love, showing the aspirations for wealth and power as pitiful and insignificant.
The maturation of the character’s spirit is one of the main ideas of the work. A young, self-searching boy who tried to understand the world by reading books, watching and listening, strived to change his life, to become more mature, but did not know how to do this. The novel “The Golden Chain” reveals the truth: changes in the manner of communication or appearance They will not give you the opportunity to mature in spirit, to become a true man. Only through actions and overcoming one’s own fears and complexes is the formation of personality possible.
Academic criticism defines the genre of the work as a detective adventure novel. Many literary scholars agree that “The Golden Chain” is a story with a detective plot. In favor of the story can be attributed the relatively small volume of the work and the short time period of the events described - the action takes place within 36 hours, which actually precludes the possibility of calling the work a novel. However, the more than developed system of characters in the novel and the gradual development of the main character make it possible to define the genre as a novel.
Stylistic affiliation of the work
A controversial issue in literary criticism is the stylistic affiliation of the work “The Golden Chain”. The work, which most researchers consider romantic, also contains features of realism and symbolism.
The first-person narration, the construction of dialogues and the dynamics of the plot unfold completely in the spirit of realism. The ideological richness of the work corresponds to romantic features that emphasize adventure, riddles and secrets, a fairy-tale palace and intrigue, hopes and dreams, love and deceit. The author tries to convey the main ideas of the work, however, not in a realistic manner and not even in the traditions of romanticism. The essence of the work is revealed through symbols, as evidenced by the title of the work “Golden Chain”. Significant images of symbolism are the book “What do we know about ourselves?”, which the young cabin boy reads in the expositional part of the novel, a tattoo with the inscription: “I know everything,” a mysterious palace, secret rooms, labyrinths, coins and, finally, a golden chain.
