Having heard that the nightingale is a great master of singing, the donkey asked him to show him his art. The nightingale burst into a wonderful trill, which people and nature listened to. The donkey restrainedly praised the nightingale and advised him, in order to “get more sharp” in singing, to learn from the yard rooster.
“God, deliver us from such judges,” is Krylov’s moral.
Donkey and nightingale
The donkey saw the nightingaleThe reason for the creation of the fable was an incident from the life of Krylov: “Some nobleman (according to some, Count Razumovsky, according to others, Prince A.N. Golitsyn), perhaps following the example of Empress Maria Fedorovna, who patronized the poet, or maybe perhaps, sincerely wanting to make acquaintance with him, he invited him to his place and asked him to read two or three fables. Krylov artistically read several fables, including one borrowed from La Fontaine. The nobleman listened to him favorably and thoughtfully said: “That’s good, but why don’t you translate like Ivan Ivanovich Dmitriev?" “I can’t,” the poet answered modestly. And so the conversation ended. Returning home, the fabulist, touched to the quick, poured out his bile in the fable “The Donkey and the Nightingale.” After the publication of the fable Krylov began to be called “Nightingale.” This nickname entered the literature.
In Krylov's fable, The Donkey and the Nightingale, each of the heroes is a symbol of qualities that are worth thinking about. So, Nightingale. The bird, with its beautiful singing, personifies a person - a master of his craft, with a gift from Nature itself. Everyone who hears it listens to the bird’s song, and everyone highly appreciates the Nightingale’s talent, which he is rightfully proud of. Krylov uses such expressive intonations and words addressed to the Nightingale, which it seems that none of the Russian writers has surpassed. Charming, detailed descriptions of the environment, the reactions of people and animals to the song of the bird, also prove that Krylov is not just a fabulist, he is a great poet. The nightingale is described in such a way that there is nothing more that would be worth adding.
The donkey, on the contrary, does not understand singing at all, but considers it possible to evaluate the Nightingale. In the absence of hearing and understanding of beauty, I thought that even a rooster could sing better. Krylov here conveys the absurdity of the current situation and sums up the moral in the last line of the fable: undertaking to judge something that you don’t even have an idea about is stupid. The Donkey, comparing the Nightingale with the Rooster, juxtaposes two perfect opposites, showing us the absence of any taste.
In 1848, a competition was announced to create a monument to the fabulist I.A. Krylov. Klodt's project won. Klodt created a realistically accurate portrait image. The sculptor depicted the fabulist sitting on a bench dressed in casual clothes in a natural, relaxed position, as if he had sat down to rest under the linden trees of the Summer Garden. All these elements focus attention on the poet’s face, in which the sculptor tried to convey the characteristics of Krylov’s personality. The sculptor managed to convey the portrait and general likeness of the poet, which was recognized by his contemporaries.
The creation of the monument to I. A. Krylov is the last major work of the sculptor P. K. Klodt. The artist A. A. Agin helped the sculptor in working on the monument.
During the process of creating the monument to Krylov, the sculptor had many birds and animals living in his workshop: a donkey, a cat, dogs, monkeys, a sheep with lambs, a fox, a crane, a frog. From them he sculpted fable characters. The master even had such large predators as a wolf (sent by the royal huntsmen) and a bear and cub (sent by the sculptor’s brother). Such a neighborhood did not cause any particular trouble for Klodt. There was only one animal Klodt did not dare to place in the workshop - a goat. Every time an old woman who lived nearby took him to Pyotr Karlovich. The animals got along calmly with each other. Only the wolf constantly hunted cats, and the bear became addicted to alcohol, which the workers treated him to. To sculpt a lion from life, Klodt went to the menagerie of the German Zam on the Fontanka. The sculptor observed the elephant in the menagerie in Tsarskoe Selo.
At the end of the work, Klodt transferred all his pets to Zam’s menagerie.
From the memoirs of P. K. Klodt’s son:
These animals lived with us like family members. And what was missing from my father’s vast workshops! They were filled with a continuous roar, howl, bleating, squeaking... All this motley society lived side by side not only in cages, many walked freely around the workshop and rooms, and were friendly with each other, except for the wolf, who could not resist Don't hunt cats.
In the spring of 1852, Klodt provided a large model of the monument for consideration by the Academy of Arts. After its approval in May 1853, the monument to Krylov was cast in bronze.
The reliefs of the pedestal depict characters and scenes from the fables: “The Fox and the Grapes”, “The Frog and the Ox”, “The Lion on the Hunt”, “The Crow and the Fox”, “The Elephant in the Field”, “The Rooster and the Grain of Pearl”, “The Little Crow” , “Quartet”, “Lion and Leopard”, “Monkey and Glasses”, “Wolf and Crane”, “Squirrel”, “Cuckoo and Rooster”, “Demyan’s Ear”, “Fortune and the Beggar”.
The donkey evaluates the Nightingale's song in Krylov's fable. A funny, beautiful and very subtle story.
The donkey saw the nightingale
And he says to him: “Listen, buddy!
You, they say, are a great master of singing.
I would really like
Judge for yourself, having heard your singing,
How great is your skill?"
Here Nightingale began to show his art:
Clicked and whistled
On a thousand frets, pulled, shimmered;
Then gently he weakened
And the languid sound of the pipe echoed in the distance,
Then it suddenly scattered in small fractions throughout the grove.
Everyone was paying attention then
To Aurora's favorite and singer;
The winds have died down, the choirs of birds have fallen silent,
And the herds lay down
Breathing a little, the shepherd admired him
And only sometimes
Listening to the Nightingale, he smiled at the shepherdess.
The singer has died. The donkey, staring at the ground with his forehead,
“Pretty much,” he says, “it’s not false to say,
I can listen to you without getting bored;
It's a pity that I don't know
You are with our rooster;
If only you had become more alert,
If only I could learn a little from him."
Hearing this judgment, my poor Nightingale
He took off and flew far away.
God save us from such judges.
In Krylov's fable, The Donkey and the Nightingale, each of the heroes is a symbol of qualities that are worth thinking about. So, Nightingale. The bird, with its beautiful singing, personifies a person - a master of his craft, with a gift from Nature itself. Everyone who hears it listens to the bird’s song, and everyone highly appreciates the Nightingale’s talent, which he is rightfully proud of. Krylov uses such expressive intonations and words addressed to the Nightingale, which it seems that none of the Russian writers has surpassed. Charming, detailed descriptions of the environment, the reactions of people and animals to the song of the bird, also prove that Krylov is not just a fabulist, he is a great poet. The nightingale is described in such a way that there is nothing more that would be worth adding.
The donkey, on the contrary, does not understand singing at all, but considers it possible to evaluate the Nightingale. In the absence of hearing and understanding of beauty, I thought that even a rooster could sing better. Krylov here conveys the absurdity of the current situation and sums up the moral in the last line of the fable: undertaking to judge something that you don’t even have an idea about is stupid. The Donkey, comparing the Nightingale with the Rooster, juxtaposes two perfect opposites, showing us the absence of any taste.
The fable “The Donkey and the Nightingale” was written no later than 1811. She was born thanks to one story that happened with Krylov. Ivan Andreevich was well aware of his strength in the fable genre. One nobleman decided to personally meet the fabulist. He called him to his place and asked him to read two or three fables. Krylov artistically read several fables and between them one, borrowed from La Fontaine. The nobleman listened favorably to the fables and thoughtfully asked why Krylov does not translate fables like Ivan Dmitriev? The wounded Krylov replied that he could not, but upon returning home, he, touched to the quick, wrote the fable “The Donkey and the Nightingale,” in which he poured out the bile that remained from the nobleman’s visit.
The fable tells how the Donkey, having listened to the wonderful singing of the Nightingale, complained that the Nightingale was unfamiliar with the Rooster, from whom, according to the Donkey, the Nightingale could learn the skill of singing. By Nightingale in this fable, Krylov understood himself. There are several versions about Donkey. Some believed that Donkey meant a nobleman who placed Dmitriev above Krylov. Someone talked about Prince A.N. Golitsin. Still others were inclined towards the candidacy of Count Razumovsky. But it is not known for certain which of the nobles served as the prototype for the Donkey. It is possible that this is a collective image.
But not only this story became the reason for writing the fable. Krylov had previously met people who self-confidently judged matters and things about which they had not the slightest idea. Such “judges” are characterized by a certain contradiction in behavior. They are self-confident, but, as a rule, ignorant. Such a contradiction causes ridicule from any outside observer. It is with ridicule that Krylov treats this kind of people in his fable.
Krylov, having decided to ridicule a similar phenomenon that occurs in our lives, chose an allegorical way to depict it. He represents a skilled artist in the image of the Nightingale. The choice was made successfully, since Nightingale, more than anyone else, can be likened to a talented artist. The judge in the fable is the Donkey, with whom readers associate the concept of stupidity and stupidity.
Since the characters' personalities are clear to the reader, the author begins the fable directly with the development of the action. The donkey wants to check other people's rumors about the nightingale's singing and calls the singer to him. Since the whole power of the story should lie in the contradiction between the ignorant judgment of the Donkey and the wonderful art of the nightingale, Krylov describes the nightingale's art in detail, emphasizing how beautiful it is. Then he shows the impression that the Nightingale made on everything around him, and finally moves on to the donkey’s judgment. The judge speaks condescendingly about the singing and only regrets that the Nightingale is unfamiliar with the rooster. The rooster is chosen here in order to depict, without further ado, the taste of a donkey: what could be more opposite than in the singing of the Nightingale and the crowing of a cock? The writer’s irony is mainly concentrated in this opposition, which is further strengthened by the Nightingale’s advice to learn a little from the rooster. What could Nightingale do with such advice? That’s what he did: “He took off and flew to distant fields.”
Allegory and irony are the basis of the literary treatment of this plot. Allegory is based on similarity, irony on opposites. Since the action of the fable is taken from real life, the expressions of the characters are borrowed from the same place.
Krylov is a great master of expressing himself in the folk spirit; but then, next to such expressions as “friend, master,” he also encounters others that do not in any way go in tune with them, for example, “everyone then listened to Aurora’s favorite and singer.”
Speaking further about the impression that the Nightingale made on everything around him with his singing, Krylov allows for a certain exaggeration: “the winds died down, the choirs of birds fell silent and the herds lay down.” Also, the images of a shepherdess and a shepherdess are taken from the imaginary happy life of a shepherd, which was described in various works of that time. The so-called “shepherd” poetry developed in the literature of Western peoples, passed on to us and caused imitation.
The moral of the fable “The Donkey and the Nightingale” is: “God, deliver us from such judges.”
What is the main meaning of the fable “The Donkey and the Nightingale”?
It is unlawful for an ignoramus to begin to judge matters in which he does not understand and is not an expert. Only a specialist in this topic can criticize constructively and give advice.
What shortcomings does Krylov ridicule in the fable “The Donkey and the Nightingale”?
Criticism, incompetence, ignorance, inability to be objective, stupidity, biased preaching.
An unfair situation, when an ignorant person undertakes to judge things beyond his control of his mind and taste, occurs offensively often. This is the fable “The Donkey and the Nightingale” by Ivan Krylov.
Contemporaries said that the poet was inspired to create the work by an incident from his life. A high-ranking nobleman, having listened to Krylov’s artistic performance of fables, praised the writer, but chided him for not following the example of another author (who wrote much weaker than Krylov). Having poured out his resentment in the fable, Ivan Andreevich still managed to create an illustration of a typical disagreement between an undeniably talented creator and an ignorant but self-confident critic. The conflict is doomed to be eternal. Its repeated projection into our lives took place with the advent of times when “the cook began to rule the state.” For creators who have experienced moments of painful bewilderment when influential people condescendingly patted them on the shoulder, saying outright nonsense about their works, it is gratifying to see an allegorical depiction of this collision as represented by the fable “The Donkey and the Nightingale.”
The author generously uses to depict the characters, the style of speech of the heroes, and describe the absurdity of the situation. First of all, opposition comes into play. The donkey, the personification of stubbornness and stupidity, contrasts with the Nightingale - a symbol of inspiration and poetry. Donkey's rough speech immediately reveals his uncouth and ambitious nature. He addresses the Nightingale in a simple way: buddy, master... The donkey has heard about the Nightingale’s charming singing, but doubts: “... is this really great... skill?” The Nightingale's answer - heavenly singing - delights everything around. The noun “skill” used by the Donkey is contrasted with the art revealed by the Nightingale.
The author offers a cascade of verbs that reinforce each other, conveying a uniquely beautiful trill: “clicked,” “whistled,” “shimmered,” “pulled,” “gently weakened,” “resounded like a pipe,” “scattered like a shot.” The fable “The Donkey and the Nightingale” depicts the complete harmony that arises in nature and in the souls of people from the Nightingale’s song. It is not for nothing that the author uses high vocabulary here: everyone listened to the pet, it became quiet, the herd lay down. There is a pastoral motif. The narrative reaches its climax when the shepherd boy listens to the Nightingale “breathing a little.” As soon as the song stops, Donkey throws out his ponderous assessment: “Pretty much!” Krylov multiplies the satirical effect by describing how a “profound” critic reacts to the singer’s reverent art: stupidly “staring at the ground with his forehead.” He just “can listen to the Nightingale without getting bored.” And of course, he considers himself a great connoisseur, so he believes that it is his duty to teach. The donkey importantly remarks, inserting here the colloquial word “perked up,” that the Nightingale would sing better if he “learned a little” from the rooster. The moral of the fable “The Donkey and the Nightingale” is expressed in a short and succinct phrase: “God, deliver us from such judges.” And in fact, false donkey authority is a great obstacle to the path of art, designed to ennoble life.
The plot of Krylov’s story inspired Russian composers to create works of the same name on this topic. Dmitry Shostakovich, in his composition “Two Fables by I. Krylov,” conveyed with extraordinary expression the clash of life positions of the characters in melodic language. Rimsky-Korsakov's romance based on the words of a popular fable is also very expressive.
Incompetence, inertia, lack of tact, inability for subtle emotional impulses - these are the qualities that the fable “The Donkey and the Nightingale” ridicules, or rather, its author - the brilliant publicist, poet and translator Ivan Andreevich Krylov.
I. S. Turgenev wrote: “From childhood, Krylov was a typical Russian person all his life: his way of thinking, views, feelings and all his writings were truly Russian, and it can be said without any exaggeration that a foreigner who thoroughly studied Krylov’s fables will have a clearer idea of the Russian national character than if he reads many works treating this subject.”
Rice. 1. O. A. Kiprensky. “Portrait of I.A. Krylova", 1816 ()
The reason for the creation of the fable was an incident from the life of Krylov (Fig. 1): “Some nobleman (according to some - Count Razumovsky, according to others - Prince A. N. Golitsyn), perhaps following the example of the imp. Maria Fedorovna, who patronized the poet, and perhaps sincerely wishing to make his acquaintance, invited him to her place and asked him to read two or three fables. Krylov artistically read several fables, including one borrowed from La Fontaine. The nobleman listened to him favorably and thoughtfully said: “That’s good, but why don’t you translate like Ivan Ivanovich Dmitriev?” “I can’t,” the poet answered modestly. That was the end of the conversation. Returning home, the fabulist, touched to the quick, poured out his bile in the fable “The Donkey and the Nightingale.” Kenevich V.F. From “Bibliographical and Historical Notes on Krylov’s Fables”
After the publication of Krylov’s fable, they began to call him “The Nightingale.” This nickname entered the literature.
Let's turn to the text of the fable.
Donkey and Nightingale (Fig. 2)
Rice. 2. Still from an animated film based on the fables of I.A. Krylov “In the world of fables” ()
The donkey saw the nightingale
And he says to him: “Listen, buddy!
You, they say, are a great master of singing.
I would really like
Judge for yourself, having heard your singing,
How great is your skill?
Here Nightingale began to show his art:
Clicked and whistled
On a thousand frets, pulled, shimmered;
Then gently he weakened
And the languid sound of the pipe echoed in the distance,
Then it suddenly scattered in small fractions throughout the grove.
Everyone was paying attention then
To Aurora's favorite and singer:
The winds have died down, the choirs of birds have fallen silent,
And the herds lay down.
Breathing a little, the shepherd admired him
And only sometimes
Listening to the Nightingale, he smiled at the shepherdess
The singer has died. Donkey, staring at the ground with his forehead;
“Pretty much,” he says, “it’s not false to say,
I can listen to you without getting bored;
It's a pity that I don't know
You are with our rooster;
If only you had become more alert,
If only I could learn a little from him.”
Hearing this judgment, my poor Nightingale
He took off and flew to distant fields.
God, save us from such judges.
Vladislav Feofilovich Kenevich, a contemporary and the first systematic researcher of Krylov’s literary activity, wrote in “Bibliographical and Historical Notes on Krylov’s Fables”: “It is known that Krylov was incomparably stricter with himself than his readers: he rewrote the same fable many times , rewrote it every time and was satisfied only when there was not a single word left in it, which, as he put it, “had become boring to him.” That is why we can claim that every word in I.A.’s fable. Krylova carries a certain semantic load.
So, there are two key images in the fable: the Donkey and the Nightingale.
What words and expressions does the fabulist use to create the image of the Donkey? Let's turn to the dictionary.
"Buddy"- a familiar address to a friend (note that the Nightingale was not a friend of the Donkey, which gives his address even more familiarity and negligence, which allows us to conclude that the Donkey is ill-mannered).
Next is the word "workshop" seems to convey admiration. A craftsman is a master, a virtuoso in his field, and even to a superlative degree. But the consonance with the word “buddy”, and even the obvious tautology “great master” again negatively characterizes the Donkey, indicating his ignorance.
TAUTOLOGY(from the Greek tauto - “the same” and logos - “word, concept”) - repetition of the same thing in different words. As a stylistic device, it refers to a type of pleonasm (excess).
"Considerably",- says the Donkey, after listening to the Nightingale’s singing. “Fairly” means “considerably, excellently.” However, in explanatory dictionaries this word is always accompanied by the mark “colloquial,” which means “colloquial.” The same can be said about words "staring" And "perked up."
Participial turnover "staring at the ground with his forehead" reminds us of donkey stubbornness. And immediately after this is the advice to “learn a little” how to sing from the rooster, which, judging by the pronoun “our,” is a close friend of the Donkey. Now let us remember the famous proverb: “Tell me who your friend is, and I will tell you who you are.” The limited rooster is a friend of the equally ignorant Donkey.
The image of the Donkey makes the reader laugh. This image is called COMIC.
By what artistic means does Krylov convey the beauty and charm of the Nightingale’s singing?
The Nightingale's singing resembles a whole concert. To do this, Krylov uses a number of homogeneous members: verbs “clicked”, “whistled”, “gave”, “crumbled”. And also a comparison with a pipe, a metaphor "scattered into small fractions", epithet "languid" pipe.
The Nightingale's singing has a wonderful effect on everyone who hears it. He charmed everyone with his singing. He brought calm to both nature and people’s lives: “the winds died down,” “the birds fell silent,” “the herds of animals lay down,” “the shepherd admired the singing.”
Everyone was paying attention then
To Aurora's favorite and singer...
AURORA- goddess of the dawn (ancient Roman mythology).
Let us pay attention to one detail: the Nightingale does not speak at all, he only sings, by this the author shows that the ignorant (colloquial and colloquial) is alien to this hero, unlike the Donkey, who constantly says something, while using mainly colloquial and colloquial vocabulary.
The author uses the technique antitheses, contrasting the Nightingale, a master of his craft, a true singer of nature, who enchants with his singing, and the Donkey, stupid, ignorant, ill-mannered, who understands nothing of real art.
ANTITHESIS- a stylistic device based on a sharp contrast of concepts and images.
The fable describes a situation that often arises in real life. Someone self-confident and ignorant undertakes to judge something about which he has no idea.
The moral of the fable lies in the words: “God deliver us from such judges.” Using the technique of allegory, the fabulist conveys to his reader the idea that if real art is often judged by those who do not understand anything about it, like the Donkey, then true masters, like the Nightingale, have a hard time.
MORALITY- This is an instructive conclusion from the main narrative, which is given at the beginning or end of the fable.
ALLEGORY- allegory - depiction of an abstract concept through a concrete image.
The fable “The Donkey and the Nightingale” was written by Ivan Andreevich Krylov more than a hundred years ago, but has not yet lost its relevance, because such stupid judges as the Donkey can be found in life in our time.
Homework
