Crime mystery from Anna Akhmatova. Literary analysis of Anna Akhmatova's poem 'The Gray-Eyed King' The Gray-Eyed King history
TWO PARTS OF VERSE. AKHMATOVA “THE GRAY-EYED KING”
Sonya Dmitrieva
The poem “The Gray-Eyed King” was written by Akhmatova in 1910 in Tsarskoe Selo.
The work is written in dactyl tetrameter with paired rhymes and masculine endings - a verse characteristic of the short ballad genre. It is worth comparing the poem with “The Sea Princess” by Lermontov.
It can be noted that not only the poetic meter and rhyme, but also the very structure of the poems (division into couplets) are the same. The works are united by the characteristics of a ballad: the presence of a plot, the theme of death, direct speech. However, Akhmatova’s ballad clearly acquires a number of lyrical features, among which one can highlight prosaic details and details (pipe, night work), elements of colloquial speech that are not typical for ballads (“you know”). If in Zhukovsky’s ballads the narrator only tells the main story, then “The Gray-Eyed King” is written from the perspective of a participant in the events. Moreover, the ballad acquires an allegorical meaning that is uncharacteristic of this genre. In the work, one can distinguish a very definite plot basis - the wife of a simple worker has a daughter from the king, the king dies while hunting (possibly at the hands of the heroine’s husband), the news of his death saddens her. But, in my opinion, you should not take the text of the work literally. It seems to me that his key phrase is the words “hopeless pain.” It is important that along with the news of the king’s death, the reader learns about the gray-eyed child. In my opinion, the gray color in the poem is a symbol of hopeless pain (you can notice not only the gray eyes of the king and the heroine's daughter, but also the gray hair of the queen). Thus, hopeless pain is reborn in the child. In this regard, it is worth noting the ring composition of the work (it begins with the news of the death of the gray-eyed king and ends with its mention; the poem begins with an exclamation in the present tense, all subsequent events are described in the past tense, then the present tense reappears in the last couplet); This composition emphasizes the motif of hopelessness. The theme of pain passing from one person to another is manifested in the poem and in the antithesis of youth and old age (the old oak tree, the gray-haired queen are contrasted with the young deceased king, the heroine’s young daughter). Moreover, old age and fading are also manifested in the mention in the poem of evening and night, autumn (as the time of withering of nature). It is also important that the evening is shown as stuffy and scarlet. Stuffiness emphasizes the general mood of the work, when the scarlet color combines the withering of trees, the death of nature, and the association with blood (that is, this word combines the themes of death and hopeless pain). In one of the comments that I found, Akhmatova’s “The Gray-Eyed King” is compared with Blok’s 1903 poem “The halls have darkened, faded...”:
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The halls became dark and faded. The window bars turned black. The vassals whispered at the door: "Queen, the queen is sick." And the king, his brows furrowed, Passed without pages and servants. And in every thrown word They caught a mortal disease. |
At the door of a silent bedroom I cried, clutching the ring. There - at the end of the distant gallery Someone echoed, covering their face. At the door of the Incomparable Lady I cried in my blue cloak. And, staggering, the same one echoed - A stranger with a pale face. |
Sasha Zhirnova
“The Gray-Eyed King” is perhaps one of the most mysterious poems in “Evenings,” Akhmatova’s first collection: its plot, its chronotope and, above all, its central image - the image of the king-beloved - are mysterious.
Let's first deal with the plot of the poem; at first glance, it is simple and uncomplicated: the lyrical heroine is in love with the king, from whom she probably has a daughter and whose death her husband informs her about, which plunges her into deep sadness. However, Akhmatova, with her characteristic laconicism, gives several clues that reveal several important mysteries of the poem. This is how the death of the “gray-eyed king” is reported:
The autumn evening was stuffy and red,
My husband returned and calmly said:
“You know, they brought it from hunting,
The body was found near the old oak tree.”
This “calm” and, in addition, complete indifference when talking about the death of the king, create the feeling that he may have died at the hands of the heroine’s husband. In addition, many questions are raised by the mention of “night work” in the fifth stanza: one could assume that the hero is a guard, but in this case there is a discrepancy with the time in the poem; Moreover, this very phrase gives rise to an association with the robber hero, who often appears in ballads.
The time in the poem is also unusual and mysterious. If you follow all the references to the passing of time, you will notice that at least a day passes between the death of the king and the moment when the heroine finds out about it. It is said about the queen that “in one night she became gray,” and the heroine’s husband, who says this, returned “in the autumn evening,” that is, the day after the king’s death - or even later. In this regard, we can make an assumption regarding the space of the poem: as we can guess, the action takes place in an unspecified European country, most likely in a rural or forest area, since in the castle and its surroundings the news of the death of the king in a day would already be known to everyone .
About time in a broader sense - that is, about the era to which the events described belong - only one detail speaks:
I found my pipe on the fireplace
Since smoking was not common in Europe until the 17th and 18th centuries, it is safe to say that the era discussed in the poem is definitely not the Middle Ages or antiquity, but a much more modern age.
In the poem, time, space, and plot are unclear, they lack clarity and unambiguity, which gives it a fairy-tale-ballad tone. The elements of a ballad also include the plot (the death of a lover), the “Europeanness”, and the narrative nature of the plot.
It is also worth noting the role of nature in The Gray-Eyed King. Zhirmunsky writes that for Akhmatova, unlike the symbolists, nature is not a mystical world of symbols and does not live, as was typical for the poets of the “real” Silver Age (mostly Fet, as well as Tyutchev), one life with the soul of the heroes - she lives and develops separately from the human soul and the events in the lives of the heroes, and is often opposed to them. Such, for example, is the contradiction between the “stuffy and scarlet” evening and the calmness of the heroine’s husband, and the “hopeless pain” in the first stanza is contrasted with the indifferent rustle of poplars in the last.
But the most mysterious thing in the poem remains the image of the “gray-eyed king.” Researchers tried to find who this poem could be dedicated to, however, since there is no way to prove otherwise, it is believed that this hero does not have any prototype and is a poetic fiction. This point of view is also confirmed by the fact that the features of the “gray-eyed king” appear in Akhmatova’s later poems:
My imagination obeys me
In the image of gray eyes.
or:
It doesn’t matter that you are arrogant and angry,
It doesn't matter that you love others.
Before me is a golden lectern,
And with me is a gray-eyed groom.
The last poem seems especially important to me (according to the first line - “I have one smile...”, 1913) - in it Akhmatova returns to the image of the gray-eyed king and rethinks it. If in the ballad one of the most important lines is “Your king is not on earth,” which refers rather not to the heroine of the poem, but to Akhmatova herself, who is in love with the poetic image, then in the 1913 poem, the “gray-eyed king” appears precisely in the image of the groom (as if in ballad, her lover returns from the dead for her).
and all fans of Akhmatova...GRAY-EYED KING
Glory to you, hopeless pain!
The gray-eyed king died yesterday.
The autumn evening was stuffy and red,
My husband returned and calmly said:
“You know, they brought it from hunting,
The body was found near the old oak tree.
Sorry about the queen. So young!..
Overnight she turned gray.”
I found my pipe on the fireplace
And he went to work at night.
I'll wake up my daughter now,
I'll look into her gray eyes.
And outside the window the poplars rustle:
"Your king is not on earth..."
Tsarskoe Selo
Several years ago I was asked to write an interpretation of The King. I wrote it then, but re-reading it, I thought that I was not entirely right and added the last paragraph. In fact, I am very ironic about the idea of retelling poetry in prose... “The Gray-Eyed King” is Akhmatova’s most famous and, perhaps, most mysterious poem. Sometimes it is called a ballad. Once he was considered dedicated to Blok, but Akhmatova did not confirm the guess, especially since she did not have an affair with Blok (but she did have one with Gumilyov). The poem contains eternal motifs of lyric poetry: love, betrayal, revenge. There is a lot of mysterious, unsaid things in it, which makes it possible for different interpretations...
What is certain is that the woman on whose behalf the poem was written loves the gray-eyed king. And he loves very much, so much that he glorifies the hopeless pain caused by the loss of a loved one (however, the first and last 2 lines may also belong to the author, enclosing the poem in a frame). She will live with this pain for a very long time, and she will cherish and love and rejoice in this pain...
Everything else in the poem is very unsteady and vague. Who is this woman, did the king love her, did her daughter inherit gray eyes from him, did her husband, apparently close to the king, know about this love, since he gives details of his death, was this death accidental, or did the husband find an opportunity to take revenge for betrayal and told his wife about it with cold cruelty? And where does all this happen, what is the name of the kingdom of the gray-eyed king? Was he old or young? Of course, I want it to - young and beautiful. And what happened at the old oak tree?..
However, for Akhmatova all this does not matter. The gray-eyed king died, leaving hopeless pain. Anna Andreevna writes about the tragedy of love with her characteristic restraint and subtlety, with that simplicity that is akin to the biblical: “Love is strong as death - and its arrows are fiery arrows.” There is not a single extra word in the poem and there is a sea of feelings, an abyss of associations. Moving away from modernity into the conventional world, so characteristic of the poetry of the Silver Age, allows us to create eternal images of love and death...
But nothing is known. What if the gray-eyed baby is the granddaughter of the king? But the bastards were not hidden, but treated kindly, given titles and lands. And then, if it were written in prose, one would have doubts. And poetry is music. Say them out loud, what do you hear? The endless repetition of “l” gives the poem tenderness, an exquisite glide, constantly returning to the key word “love”, a word that is unsaid, but easily guessed...
Written in dactyl tetrameter, the poem is very musical, but one can discern in it not a romance, but a sad song in the spirit of minstrels or Sappho. The poem is similar to the masterpieces of the Hellenic singer of love not only in its general tonality, but also in the meter of the verse itself. Written in the most common iambic in Russian poetry, the poem would have sounded different.
And still something doesn’t connect and falls out. What? The word “work”: service to the king would hardly be called such a boring bourgeois word. It seems that the husband had nothing to do with the king, and the circumstances of his death were simply heard or read. Then the woman did not know the king, he did not suspect her love and, perhaps, adored his queen. And your daughter’s gray eyes? They say it happens. She lived in a world of boredom and dullness, but she dreamed of unearthly love, she invented this love for herself, she lived it and gave birth to a daughter... with the eyes of a king...
May Anna Andreevna forgive me! And happy birthday!..
Introduction
Main part
1 Level of conceptual analysis
2 Level of internal form analysis
3 Level of external form analysis
4 Analysis of rhythm, rhyme and stanza
Conclusion
Bibliography
Introduction
Starting a literary analysis of Anna Akhmatova’s poem “The Gray-Eyed King,” let’s first find out who Anna Akhmatova is.
Anna Andreevna Akhmatova (Gorenko) (1889-1966) - Russian Soviet poetess, translator and literary critic, one of the most significant figures in Russian literature of the 20th century. A former “sinner” and socialist-revolutionary atheist, she, according to Korney Chukovsky in the early 20s of the 20th century, became “the last and only poet of Orthodoxy.” Although even the climate of Russia was contraindicated for her, as a person suffering from tuberculosis, she “was with my people where my people, unfortunately, were.”
Anna Akhmatova belonged to the Acmeist movement, which reached its culmination in 1913. The main members of the Acmeist group, in addition to Anna Akhmatova, were her first husband Nikolai Gumilyov, Sergei Gorodetsky, Osip Mandelstam, Vladimir Narbut and Mikhail Zenkevich. Acmeism was sometimes also called Adamism. In 1913, Gumilyov wrote about acmeism: “...from the word acme - the highest degree of something, color, blooming time...”, then about Adamism: “... a courageously firm and clear outlook on life... ". Acceptance of the earthly world in its visible concreteness, a keen look at the details of existence, a living and immediate sense of nature, culture, the universe and the material world, the thought of equality were important for the Acmeists. They decided to reject the aspiration to “other worlds” and disregard for earthly reality. The Acmeists adhered to the brevity of the narrative and the clarity of the lyrical plot.
During her lifetime, Anna Akhmatova published collections and books of poems: "Evening" (1912), "Rosary" (1914), "White Flock" (1917), "Plantain" (1921), "Anno Domini" (1922), "The Running of Time" " (1965) (including the cycles "Secrets of Craft", 1936-1960; "Wind of War", 1941-1944; "Northern Elegies", 1940-1945; poem "Poem without a Hero", 1940-1962). Other lifetime editions of Anna Akhmatova's poetry include Selected Books (1943); Selected Poems (1946); Poems (1958); Poems (1961) and Voices of Poets (1965).
Pushkin influenced Akhmatova’s work, she wrote many articles about him; she owns memoirs (including “About Alexander Blok”, “Amedeo Modigliani” (both editions - 1967) and translations of classical poetry of the East, Ancient Egypt, Italian poetry.
Research on Anna Akhmatova's creativity:
· Poems and poems, Leningrad, 1984; Poems and prose, Leningrad, 1976; About Pushkin, L., 1977. · Anna Akhmatova. In 5 books. Compilations and notes by R. Timenchik, K. Polivanov, V. Morderer. - M., 1989; · Eikhenbaum B., Anna Akhmatova. - P., 1923; · Vinogradov V., About the poetry of Anna Akhmatova. - P., 1925; · V.M. Zhirmunsky. The work of Anna Akhmatova. - L.: Nauka, 1973. - 183 p. Pavlovsky A.I., Anna Akhmatova. Essay on creativity, 2nd ed. - L., 1982; · Vilenkin V.Ya. In the one hundred and first mirror. - M., 1987. - 320 p.; · Height A., Anna Akhmatova: A poetic journey. - M., 1991; · Chukovskaya L. Notes about Anna Akhmatova. In 3 volumes - M., 1997; · Valery Dementyev. Predicted days of Anna Akhmatova. Reflections on the creative path. - M.: Sovremennik, 2004. - 320 p.; · Evgeny Dobin. Poetry of Anna Akhmatova. Publisher: Soviet Writer (Leningrad Branch), 1968 The poem "The Gray-Eyed King" is one of Anna Akhmatova's early works, written in 1910, first published in 1912 in her first poetry collection "Evening". The poem is taken from the collected works of Anna Akhmatova in six volumes, from the first volume on page 41: Gray-Eyed King 1Sla ́ wow you ́ , desolate ́ bottom bo ́ eh! 2U ́ measures yesterday ́ serogla ́ zyy koro ́ l. Ve ́ black ose ́ he was du ́ shen and a ́ l, Mu ́ my, I'll return it ́ sitting down, calmly ́ yno skaz ́ l: "I know ́ eat with joy ́ you are his ́ brought ́ ,
Those ́ lo u hundred ́ rogo do ́ ba found ́ .
Zha ́ l the king ́ woo. Taco ́ th young ́ y!.. Behind ́ one night ́ she's a hundred ́ la sedo ́ th". True ́ your book ́ na kami ́ not ours ́ l AND ́ to work ́ that night ́ Yu Usha ́ l. Before ́ my chick ́ I'm now ́ I'll wake you up ́ ,
All ́ red eyes ́ her names ́ I'll take a look ́ .
A ́ outside the window ́ m rustling ́ tons of poplar ́ :
"Not ́ t on the ground ́ yours ́ king ́ …"
December 11, 1910 Tsarskoe Selo
Commentary from the collected works of Anna Akhmatova in six volumes, in the first volume on page 711, compiled for this edition by N.V. Queen: Gray-Eyed King
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For the first time - Apollo magazine. 1911. No. 4. P. 20; "Evening". P. 67; "The Running of Time". P. 37. Published from the book “The Running of Time.” Date - according to the list of N.L. Dilactorskaya. One of Akhmatova's most famous early poems. RGALI’s rough autograph speaks of the poet’s careful work on the lines: 4My husband told me about death with a smile; My husband told me something terrible with a smile; My husband, returning, said with a smile: 6The body was found in a ravine near a river; The body was found in a ravine near the tower In the collection “From Six Books,” two lines appeared in the text after the 12th: “And I will show her over the palace tower // Funeral flag for the death of her father.” In the book "The Running of Time" these lines are excluded. According to Akhmatova, the poem was "an experiment in balladry." The scheme of images - king, queen, husband, wife, lover, mourning the dead king, resembles the scheme of images of A. Blok's poem "Darkened, the halls have faded..." (1903): "The Queen, the Queen is sick", "... the king, frowning his brows", the queen's lover, who "cryed, clutching the ring" and someone else, "a stranger with a pale face", who echoed to the sobs of a beloved (Blok, 1. p. 263). A romance based on the words of this poem was performed by A. Vertinsky. *
Tsarskoe Selo is the pre-revolutionary name of the city of Pushkin. As a one-year-old child, Anya Gorenko was transported to the north - first to Pavlovsk, then to Tsarskoe Selo. She lived there until she was 16 years old. In Tsarskoe Selo, the Gorenko family settled in Shukhardina’s house, where they lived until 1905. Nowadays Station Square is located there. * "
Apollo" is a Russian literary and artistic magazine associated with symbolism, later with Acmeism. Published in St. Petersburg in 1909-1917 (ed. - S.K. Makovsky; in 1909-1910 monthly, then 10 issues per year). "Apollo" "published materials on the history of art, reviews of exhibitions, theatrical and musical life in Russia and other countries; covered the problems of studying and protecting monuments of Russian art. * "
Evening" is the first collection of poetry by Anna Akhmatova, published in 1912 in the publication "Workshop of Poets" with a circulation of 300 copies. It contained 46 poems. * "
The Running of Time" is a book of poems by Anna Akhmatova, published in 1965. *
"From Six Books" is a collection of poems by Anna Akhmatova, published in 1940. *
Ballad (French ballade, from Provence balada - dance song) - 1. Solid form of French poetry of the 14th-15th centuries: three stanzas with the same rhymes (ababbcbc for 8-syllable, ababbccdcd for 10-syllable verse) with a refrain and a final half-strophe - “message” (address to the addressee). 2. Lyric-epic genre of English-Scottish folk poetry of the 14th-16th centuries. on historical (later also fairy-tale and everyday) themes, usually with tragedy, mystery, abrupt narration, and dramatic dialogue. Collected works: In 6 volumes / Comp., prepared. text, comment. and articles by N.V. Queen. - M.: Ellis Luck, 1998.- 968 p. Akhmatova A. Works: In 2 volumes / Comp. and preparation of the text by M.M. Kralina. - M.: Pravda, 1990. - 448 + 432 p. Akhmatova, Anna Andreevna. Favorites / A. Akhmatova; [comp., author. note I.K. Sushilina; artist I.V. Danilevich]. - M.: Education, 1993. - 318, p.: ill. - (B-ka vocabulary) Akhmatova A. Selected / Comp. and entry Art. N. Bannikova. - M.: Fiction, 1974. Akhmatova, Anna Andreevna. Selected lyrics / A. Akhmatova. - L.: Detgiz, 1977. - 223 p. : ill., 1 l. portrait - (Poetic book of a schoolboy) Akhmatova, Anna Andreevna. Lyrics / A. Akhmatova; [art. I. Makhov]. - M.: Artist. lit., 1989. - 415 pp.: ill. - (Classics and contemporaries: KS. Poetic library) Akhmatova A. Poems and Poems / Ed. V.M. Zhirmunsky. - L., 1976. - (Poet's Library). Research Quotes
“...Akhmatova’s poems, contrary to the trends that prevailed in her youth, are devoid of the stamp of the superficial and then fashionable “modernism”. The simplicity and transparency of their artistic form, the truthfulness and authenticity of feeling, the objectivity of the artistic method, with all the unique personal originality - these are the features of her poetry continue the traditions of Russian realistic art of the 19th century, complicated by all the wealth of spiritual and artistic discoveries of our time, but devoid of any ostentatious innovation.<…> The plot-driven nature of Akhmatova’s early lyrics, the presence of a narrative element, a story in it, indicate a tendency to move beyond the closed boundaries of intimate lyrics as an expression of instantaneous emotional experience.<…> Experience in the small semi-epic genre is... the ballad "The Gray-Eyed King" (1911) - a poem that immediately gained wide popularity among readers. It was set to music several times. The ballad character gives the poetic narrative a classic ballad meter (three-syllable feet in couplets with paired masculine rhymes, which in this genre are a heritage of English folk and romantic examples). The ballad atmosphere is created by references to the “king” and “queen”, to the “hunt” during which, as one might think, a murder took place, and the romance of secret, illicit love. However, there is no epic interpretation as such in this ballad: the poem contains only the denouement of the tragedy, the actual content of which is not told, but the meaning is recreated by hints: the contrast of the murdered king and the “calm” husband, the queen who turned gray overnight and the tragically silent and unrequited heroine, and the ending , which echoes the beginning of the poem and reveals its meaning: “Your king is not on earth...”. The remaining events do not require mention or explanation, because they are indifferent to the internal lyrical understanding of the plot. The search for a large epic form, containing within its framework both biographical memories and a picture of the era, passes through all stages of Akhmatova’s creative development." "... Judging by the drafts preserved in the archives, ... twists in creative decisions were characteristic of Akhmatova most often in recent years. But sometimes they retrospectively concerned some of her earliest lyric poems. One such example is found by reading the draft autograph of the famous “Grey-Eyed King” of 1910 year ("Library of the Poet", No. 34, pp. 384-385). It seems that it was precisely his excessive popularity that seemed tendentious to her in some sense: she somehow connected this popularity with the desire to “wall up” her poetry in the 10s, a desire that was quite widespread not so long ago in critical and memoir writing. literature, especially in the West. So, in the rough autograph of the so-called “bloc book” of TsGALI, this little ballad looks like a romantically stylized watercolor, with its half-hidden “background” of the heroine’s secret and sinful love for the late king (“I’ll wake up my daughter now, // In the gray eyes I’ll take a look at it”), still retained a stanza that was almost destructive precisely for this “second plan”, which, perhaps, lies the whole charm of the poem: And I'll show her over the palace tower Funeral flag for the death of his father. Anna Andreevna included this stanza in the republication of poems from “Evening” in 1940 (collection “From Six Books”). However, later she resolutely rejected it. From the rough autograph one can see the poet's initial work - a gradual artistic clarification of the text with a number of successful lexical substitutions, especially the husband's direct speech. It turns out that such work is also typical for the “beginner” Akhmatova. Returning to her old poems in connection with reprints, which so rarely pleased her, especially in recent years, Akhmatova nevertheless took the opportunity to replace or cross out what no longer satisfied her, sometimes even in the most famous, almost textbook popular poem ". “The single theme in Akhmatova’s poetry is a strange dream about a mysterious lover who left his beloved. The world in which the poet’s soul lives is simple and real, but behind this apparent simplicity, behind this clarity of images and thoughts, lies an invisible world, full of anxiety and mystery. We learn about this only because the images, simple in themselves, appear before us in such a combination that makes them mysterious psychologically and symbolic in their essence. In her poems, Akhmatova sings “His image of the dead groom appears to her everywhere.” ", like Don Juan, wanders around the world, anxiously awaiting some fateful meeting. But her hopes are in vain, and her “dead dawns” in the mourning sky are sad and terrible." “There is a lot of “Japanese” art in Anna Akhmatova’s poems. The same fragmentation of perspective, the same complete disregard for the “empty” space separating the foreground from the background; the same ability in a complex landscape to find those three trees that will fill the whole area with vegetation , or that single, barely outlined cone that will give a feeling of extreme “mountaininess”.<…>Sometimes one likes the perception of it because of its intricate materiality: “High in the sky, a cloud turned gray, like a spread squirrel skin.” Anna Akhmatova lives in a small but intricate labyrinth of her sensations, the sophistication of which is not monotonous...” “In Akhmatova’s poetry, all the poems, the secret addressee of which I assume is Modigliani, fit into a certain time frame and are arranged into a lyrical plot: meeting, separation, anticipation of a new meeting, a feeling of sin, dislike for her husband, betrayal.<…>The “toy boy”… had gray eyes; “the whole inheritance” could be given for it; I dreamed of him “wearing a crown” or as a groom who was killed “not in a bloody duel”, but when he “walked towards me in love”; He is also the king, the cause of “hopeless pain.” All these are quite convincing indications that their prototype was the same person, who forever remained in Akhmatova’s memory “not at all like anyone else in the world.” “And everything divine in Modigliani only sparkled through some kind of darkness.” "The Gray-Eyed King" was written in 1910. The success that befell this poem irritated Akhmatova. It was notable for the fact that for the first time the theme of adultery was openly voiced in it (the heroine is a married woman). If we consider it in comparison with others, thematically similar, it leads us to such poems as “My husband whipped me with a patterned, double-folded belt...”. 1. Main part
.1 Level of conceptual analysis
When starting a conceptual analysis of the poem “The Gray-Eyed King,” it is worth noting that it has a love, intimate theme: there are many hints in the poem, but there are no clear answers. On the contrary, the poem is ambiguous. Perhaps it talks about betrayal, which can be assumed from the second (“The gray-eyed king died yesterday”) and twelfth (“I’ll look into her gray eyes”) lines, in which the king and the daughter of the lyrical heroine are both gray-eyed. The daughter's gray eyes may indicate that she is the daughter of a gray-eyed king. Perhaps this is too obvious a conclusion. Those gray eyes could also remind the heroine of a lost love - or just an unreal love she never had. In the work we see dramatic pathos, however, it begins with irony (“Glory to you, hopeless pain!”), which shows the attitude of the lyrical heroine to the news about the death of the king, but later the heroine remains silent. This indifference of hers gives rise to intrigue, because from the first, eleventh (“I’ll wake up my daughter now”) and fourteenth (“Your king is not on earth”) lines you can guess that this calmness is feigned and there’s something wrong with her king after all connects; Perhaps the heroine is afraid to react somehow in front of her husband or strives to forget the king, does not want to know about him - this may also determine her calmness. The poem belongs to descriptive lyrics, the conflict here is psychological, there is a certain struggle with oneself. There is also intrigue in how “calmly” the husband of the lyrical heroine informs her of death, and what kind of “night” work he has is also not clear. And the way Akhmatova carefully selected the words for the fourth (“My husband, when he returned, said calmly”) and sixth (“The body was found near the old oak”) lines gives grounds for thought. .2 Internal form analysis level Akhmatova Acmeism ballad rhythm When starting to analyze the internal form of the poem, it is worth noting that it consists of seven distic stanzas. Being a plot miniature, it has the following composition: the first stanza is the beginning: here we actually learn about what is the cause and impetus for further events - the death of the “gray-eyed king”; the second, third, fourth and fifth stanzas are the development of the action, during which the image of the already mentioned “king” develops and two new images appear: the queen, who turned gray from grief “in one night,” and the husband of the lyrical heroine, who calmly announced his death and gone to “night” work, which becomes the reason for the climax in the sixth stanza, where the heroine lifts the veil of another secret - her daughter is gray-eyed, here there is a clear connection with the “gray-eyed” king. And the ending completes everything in the seventh stanza, from which it is clear that the king belongs or once belonged to her (“Your king is not on earth”). Following further, it should be noted that the poem contains only one description in the third line (“The autumn evening was stuffy and red”), which brings a certain gloom to the atmosphere; What is especially noteworthy is that there are as many as four specific time frames (“yesterday”, “autumn evening”, “one night”, “night”), while all attention is focused on the development of the main images, and the space surrounding them is blurred, it is not given much attention; further we note in the text two direct speeches in the fifth and fourteenth lines. From the analysis of the internal form, we can conclude that in the center there are only the main images, there seems to be no surrounding space, everything is extremely simple and clear, there is only that which is most capable of revealing the central images, but at the same time leaves some intrigue, ambiguity. The images are to some extent folkloric, but at the same time simple to understand; there is no ambiguity here, and only their interaction causes psychological tension. 1.3 External form analysis level
Getting to the lexical-morphological and semantic level of analysis of the poem "The Gray-Eyed King", it must be said that it includes means of expressiveness of artistic speech. The author uses metalogical speech, since we see that there are means of expression, rhythm, rhyme, poetic form, that is, words are used in a figurative meaning. From the first lines, the author uses an oxymoron, which shows the attitude of the lyrical heroine to the events that followed; the epithet "desperate pain" enhances the irony. “In one night she turned gray” is a hyperbole present in order to show how great the queen’s grief is in comparison with the heroine’s silence. “The poplars rustle” is a metaphor; this quiet rustle symbolizes the thoughts of the heroine herself, who is forced to remain silent so as not to reveal her feelings. There are five characters in the poem "The Gray-Eyed King": the lyrical heroine, the king, the heroine's husband, the queen, and the heroine's daughter. The three characters of the poem are united by the color gray: the gray eyes of the king and daughter, the gray hair of the queen. From a phonetic point of view, all these words are also united by sound With.
In conclusion of the analysis, it is worth noting that the poem is written in simple language with a small number of tropes; Anna Akhmatova depicts the material world with clear clarity and the influence of Acmeism is obvious in this. 1.4 Analysis of rhythm, rhyme and stanza
The poem "The Gray-Eyed King" is written in a stable dactyl tetrameter and consists of seven distic stanzas. Anacrusis and epicruse are zero throughout the poem; rhyme - adjacent (aabbccddeeggff), each stanza has its own rhyme pair; The clause throughout the poem is terminal, masculine, precise, poor. Below is a schematic analysis of the rhythm and stress, as well as the rhyme pair of the poem: 1Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10 bo ́ l - koro ́ l 2Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10
Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10 a ́ l - tale ́ l Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10
Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10 brought ́ - found ́
6Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10
Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10 young ́ th - gray ́ th Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10
Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10 ours ́ l - ear ́ l Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10
Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10 I'll wake you up ́ - I'll take a look ́
12Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10
Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10 poplars ́ - king ́
14Ú - - Ú - - Ú - - Ú 1, 4, 7, 10
In conclusion of the analysis, it is worth noting that, due to its form and size, the poem has obvious similarities with the folk genre of the medieval ballad. Conclusion
The poem "The Gray-Eyed King" belongs to the lyric-epic genre, executed in the form of a plot miniature of the ballad genre. Refers to the early works of A. Akhmatova, when she was part of the Acmeists, which was clearly reflected in her lyrics. The poetry of Acmeism echoed past literary eras, hence the unusual genre of the “Grey-Eyed King” and medieval images. It is very interesting that gray eyes appear in seven poems by Anna Akhmatova. These poems were created over the course of five years. The first of them was written on December 7, 1910. The first three poems were written in Tsarskoye Selo. Of these, only “The Gray-Eyed King” was published in Vechera. The following three poems are from 1913. All of them are from Akhmatova’s second collection of poems - “The Rosary”. The last poem where we meet the gray-eyed man is the poem “By the Sea”, written in 1914. All seven poems deal with the theme of separation - and some also with the theme of forbidden love. In "The Gray-Eyed King" the king dies. In the third poem, the gray-eyed toy boy is again with the heroine, but the cuckoo on the clock will soon say “it’s time.” The last poem in which the gray-eyed boy appears is a poem called “By the Sea,” written in 1914 in Slepnev and Tsarskoe Selo. In this poem, the heroine refers to her childhood. Akhmatova herself said that the poem “By the Sea” was her farewell to childhood. She said goodbye to the “wild girl” and knew that war would soon begin. Perhaps the gray-eyed king symbolizes someone Akhmatova loved when she was young. But perhaps Akhmatova's words about her farewell to childhood mean that the gray-eyed man symbolizes her youth - or at least some part of her youth. After "By the Sea" Akhmatova never mentions the gray-eyed man. Bibliography
1.Collected works: In 6 volumes. T. 1. Poems. 1904-1941/ Comp., prepared. text, comment. and articles by N.V. Koroleva.- M.: Ellis Luck, 1998.- 968 p. 2.V.M. Zhirmunsky. The work of Anna Akhmatova. - L.: Nauka, 1973. - 183 p. Vilenkin IN. In the one hundred and first mirror (Anna Akhmatova). - M.: Soviet writer, 1987. - 320 p. Kovalenko S. (comp.) Anna Akhmatova: pro et contra. T.I. - St. Petersburg: Publishing house of the Russian Christian Humanitarian Institute, 2001. - 992 p. Natalya Lyanda .
“Angel with a sad face” // The image of Anna Akhmatova in the work of Modigliani. - St. Petersburg: 1996. - P. 5-52. Akhmatova A.A. Poems and poems / M.: Eksmo, 2006. - 686 pp., ill. - (Library of World Literature). 7. Encyclopedic dictionary of a young literary critic / Comp. IN AND. Novikov.- M.: Pedagogy, 1988.- 416 p.: ill. 8. Russian literature: A large educational reference book for schoolchildren and those entering universities. - M.: Bustard, 1998. - 1296 p. 9. Literary encyclopedic dictionary / Under the general. ed. V.M. Kozhevnikova, P.A. Nikolaev.- M.: Sov. encyclopedia, 1987.- 752 p.
This story should be of particular interest to fans of the series." Game of Thrones“- after all, the victim of the murder was none other than the careless and unbridled ruler in his sexual desires.
We're talking, of course, about a ballad." Gray-Eyed King"from Akhmatova's first poetry collection" Evening", which was released in 1912 year.
Here is its text:
Glory to you, hopeless pain!
The gray-eyed king died yesterday.
The autumn evening was stuffy and red,
My husband returned and calmly said:
“You know, they brought it from hunting,
The body was found near the old oak tree.
Sorry about the queen. So young!..
Overnight she turned gray.”
I found my pipe on the fireplace
And he went to work at night.
I'll wake up my daughter now,
I'll look into her gray eyes.
And outside the window the poplars rustle:
"Your king is not on earth..."
Tsarskoe Selo
And here is the canonical performance of this poem by Alexander Vertinsky:
Well, sit in a circle on the veranda of the old house, help yourself to tea with cherry jam - those who smoke a pipe sit further away - let's begin to study the introductory incidents.
Given:
Death of the King.
Name – unknown, age – young, cause of death – unknown, place of residence – unknown. Marital status: Married. Special features - characteristic gray eyes.
The witness is an anonymous woman.
Name – unknown, age – unknown (childbearing age), place of residence – unknown. Family status: Married. Additional information - has a daughter with characteristic gray eyes.
The witness testifies from the words of her husband. Extremely worried about the death of the king.
Excitement, complemented by the peculiarity of her daughter’s appearance, gives reason to assume that the witness had an affair with the deceased.
Previously, the analysis of the poem was limited to this information, arguing that the remaining circumstances of the king’s death were shrouded in mystery and it was impossible to know anything about them exactly.
I undertake to prove that we're dealing with murder, the killer is known to us, even the details of what happened are known, and all this is contained in witness statements in which there is practically no random information.
So, gentlemen, of course, killer - witness's husband.
We know about this not only because he had a motive, but also based on the story of the unfortunate woman.
1. This crime was carefully planned and prepared
I dare to say that revenge for adultery was planned in advance and overtook the king at the most unexpected moment for him, and here’s why:
The witness gave birth to a daughter as a result of a love affair with the deceased (and from her reaction we see that, at a minimum, she took what happened extremely seriously).
If the king had been a Moor, everything would have become obvious right away, but he had a different appearance.
The color of my daughter’s eyes very convincingly confirms this closeness today. BUT!
You and I know that all children are born with gray, blue or gray-blue eyes.
AND Children's eye color can change up to three years of age. Sometimes it is so striking that until the very end the mother is not completely sure of the final eye color of her child.
That's why we can say: the heroine's daughter is at least three years old - " I'll look into her gray eyes..."
And this means that for three years the offended man - the witness’s husband - was forced to live, tormented by suspicions, in the hope that they would not be justified. For three years he peered into the eyes of his child, praying that they would at least change their shade.
And all this time, the eyes of the one who disgraced him looked at him from his crib..
Oh yeah! This man had time to plan his revenge in case his worst suspicions were confirmed.
And they, as we see now, have been confirmed!
2. The time of meeting between the heroine and her husband plays a central role in the investigation.
If you look closely, without additional explanations, the remoteness of the moment of the king’s death from the witness’s meeting with her husband may seem strange.
But in fact it clarifies many details of the incident and confirms its violent, criminal nature.
Think about it: in a certain area, a king is dying - a figure, to put it mildly, quite noticeable.
The event is exceptional. But a woman who is not indifferent to the king, who gave birth to a daughter from him, finds out about this only in the evening. next!!! day. How is this possible if death overtook the ruler not in the quiet of his chambers, but on the street, where he became immediately known to many people? – " They brought it from hunting..."
There is only one answer - the woman was in isolation.
Her husband locked her at home, having previously informed her that he was going to punish his eminent offender.
The unfortunate woman spent about two days in uncertainty, suffering from hopelessness: she had to accept either the death of her lover or the detention of her husband, which would inevitably lead to her sin becoming public.
This expectation plunged her into a frenzy - this is how a defendant feels during an endless trial, when he doomedly and joyfully welcomes any sentence, even the most cruel one towards himself: Glory to you, hopeless pain! Died...
It may seem to some that the argument about isolation has not been proven and how could the woman know about the death of the king the day before, and her husband only told her additional details? - But, no: in this case, the husband would find his wife experiencing grief in an embrace with a child. And so, only after meeting her husband - a cruel, proud and murderer - a woman instinctively rushes to her daughter to see in her eyes the farewell look of the king - her father.
3. The killer incriminates himself with his actions and words.
Let's summarize:
The unfortunate adulteress was locked at home, awaiting the outcome of the revenge planned by her husband.
Therefore, she understands everything even before her husband utters the first words.
Therefore, during the story, the husband is calm, and not excited, like other idle onlookers.
Therefore, the avenger only tells his wife the details of what happened: " The body was found near the old oak tree..."
Perhaps the old oak tree played some role in this story: for example, meetings between the king and his favorites took place under its crown.
Another thing is important: the killer makes it clear to his wife that the death of his rival was cruel and terrible.
He does this in a very peculiar way - remembering the widowed queen: " overnight she turned gray"
Medicine knows cases when people turn gray from grief, but most often such metamorphoses occur to a person due to fear. What could have frightened the king's wife so much? – Obviously, the appearance of the body. And fear for your life.
Why did she have reason to be afraid? – time of writing the poem: the beginning of the 20th century – a period of revolutions and anti-monarchist protests.
Probably, the queen simply could not imagine that such cruelty could have ordinary, everyday reasons.
4. Main proof
Skeptics in the front rows of our makeshift salon fidget and frown - they can’t wait to declare that everything said above is empty speculation, not supported by facts.
Well, Gentlemen, I have a fact that undoubtedly proves my husband’s guilt.
And from the sly glances of some smokers in the back rows, I see that they have already guessed everything: " I found my pipe on the fireplace and went to work for the night..."
Pipe, gentlemen! My husband, a smoker, was not at home for more than a day, and his pipe was lying on the fireplace all this time..
How can this be, you ask?! If he is used to taking her everywhere with him!
Yes, he simply had to go to a place where the smoke of tobacco could give him away and, in order not to take risks and not be distracted by temptations, he left her at home.
What kind of place is this - empty and filled with clean air - where smoke from a pipe can give away its owner? - Of course, the forest where the deceived husband hid, hunting the king.
Here one could fantasize about " night work", but let's leave that for future detectives.
I consider the task stated at the beginning of our conversation to be completed and the crime solved!
It is interesting that all the rehash of this detective story is reflected intonationally by Vertinsky in his performance of the ballad. Did Akhmatova reveal the secret of her poem to him or did he guess everything himself? We, apparently, will never know...
PS. As a bonus, I suggest you listen to another ballad by Vertinsky about the death of another loving king. This time at the hands of revolutionaries. The topic was obviously in the air and was in great demand at the beginning of the last century.
The story "The Gray-Eyed King" This Cinderella's mother was very good. Smart, beautiful. Her name was Anna Andreevna. Well, you know what the stepmother was like. And you know the beginning of the fairy tale very well. And then it happened like this: the Prince, in a wrinkled ball gown, with buttons undone and ribbons untied, sat on the stairs and cried. The queen, who was informed of what had happened, went down to her son and, wiping the blood from his hands with a handkerchief, asked affectionately: “How?” How was she able to seduce you? - Mother! - said the prince. - On the first night we only kissed. The second time she opened her chest to me. Well, today! She wasn't wearing any panties!.. No panties. I swear! The prince cried inconsolably. Tears of remorse flowed from his gray eyes. He was smart and far-sighted beyond his age: now he understood what this night threatened him with. His upcoming engagement to the daughter of the King of the Mirror may be disrupted. And it's terrible! - I believe you, my boy. These provincial girls! I felt that there was a snake hiding under the gentle face! But I didn't think she was so dangerous. The queen's eyes flashed with bloody boys. She was angry, but kept her cool. After all, she has been on the throne for so many years, and there is always intrigue, intrigue, intrigue... But they also affected her son. - She was probably sent by the Queen of Uzerkalya with the help of her sorceress friend! How poorly the kingdom's security service works. How poorly they work... “I’m scheduling a meeting of the State Council for ten in the morning,” she ordered imperiously, turning to the chancellor standing modestly at the window. - And so that all special services are represented by top officials. - Do you have any items of her personal use? - the queen asked the prince. - Well, maybe she gave you something as a keepsake. We would set sniffer dogs on the trail. “Mom, it’s okay,” he threw up his hands. - Oh yes! The crystal slipper... At a meeting of the State Council, several options were proposed for searching for the villain: using Tarot cards, by blood type, some others, and the most seemingly unrealistic one is the crystal slipper. But, oddly enough, together with the will of the queen, it worked. Experts immediately determined that this shoe was from the royal museum, and stated that, together with its pair, it was stolen from there on the night of the first ball, moreover, using a witchcraft method, namely, direct teleportation without criminals entering the museum building. But the queen showed persistence; she ordered all girls and women from 14 to 25 years old to be brought to the capital to try on shoes and personally participated in the identification. And then, after three months, the villain was found. Yes, she was pregnant. “You were hiding because you wanted to show up with an already born child and blackmail us!” - the queen shouted at Cinderella. - You should have an abortion. - Your Highness! - the king intervened. - Fear God! What are you offering?! We are Christians. And the girl is not to blame for anything. We need to find an option that suits everyone. And this option was found. The Chancellor, who was in charge of the most secret police, reported that Cinderella had an admirer who had already wooed her several times. It was a young huntsman, a friend of Cinderella’s father, who, as you remember, worked as a forester. It was decided, and this plan was carried out, to persuade the huntsman to “close his eyes” to the bride’s loss of virginity and recognize the child as his own, and for this the king gave the young couple a luxurious house on the edge of the forest and a certain amount of money. He also guaranteed his patronage in the future. The wedding was played modestly, but they lived well, in prosperity and harmony. And my daughter made me happy: the gray-eyed little girl grew up cheerful and obedient, just like her mother. The huntsman spent a lot of time at work, and Cinderella was busy around the house. This idyll would have continued like this, but the old king died, the prince took his father’s throne, married the daughter of the King of the Mirror, and his blood began to play: he began to visit Cinderella in secret from the huntsman, well, you know... And when the daughter doesn’t - grew up a lot, the mother began to leave the girl alone in the house, and the lovers met under an old oak tree, where a huntsman once tracked them down. He was a good guy, but he couldn’t forgive the betrayal. He didn’t say anything to anyone, however, a plan for revenge was brewing in his head. And matured. He made a secret trap on the path, and during the hunt, the king’s horse, at full gallop, caught its foot in it, fell, the king flew out of the saddle and fell to his death. When the huntsman returned from the city, he told his wife: “They brought him to the palace already dead.” The body was found not far from an old oak tree. It's a pity for the queen: so young, but she turned gray overnight. Whether Cinderella guessed about her husband’s role in what happened or not, we will probably never know. She fought back her tears with great effort. When the husband, having found his smoking pipe on the fireplace, went to work at night, the girl burst into tears. She rushed to her daughter’s crib, woke her up and, looking into the child’s gray eyes, cried inconsolably. - What will happen to the girl now? - she whispered. -What fate awaits her? Will she become another victim of palace intrigue? Cinderella was especially frightened by the possible revenge of the old queen. Who will protect them? There is no longer a single king left on earth. It was the beginning of autumn, the wind was blowing, poplars were rustling outside the window... Here’s the story. Someone, having read it, will think that the author is great, he has composed a beautiful continuation of the famous fairy tale. But no! I didn't write anything. Everything has already been composed and written and rewritten under this moon. And I wrote off this story. And do you know who? With Anna Andreevna Akhmatova. I told you that this Cinderella’s mother was very good. Don't believe me? Read: Anna Akhmatova * * * Glory to you, hopeless pain! The gray-eyed king died yesterday. The autumn evening was stuffy and red. My husband, returning, calmly said: You know, they brought him back from hunting, They found his body near an old oak tree. Sorry about the queen. So young!.. Overnight she turned gray. I found my pipe on the fireplace and went to work at night. I’ll wake up my daughter now, I’ll look into her gray eyes. And outside the window the poplars rustle: Your king is not on earth... 1910
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