Lermontov's Junker poems and their brief analysis

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

Lermontov's works, written during the years he spent in the cadet school, are hardly familiar to a wide range of readers. It is customary not to discuss or even remember the details of his life and work of this period, so as not to sully the bright memory of the genius of Russian literature. Meanwhile, it was then that the famous Junker poems of Lermontov were written! “Hospital”, “Peterhof Holiday” and “Ulansha” cannot be called examples of high style even with a stretch, but there is no way to throw them out of the legacy of the poet’s work - these cadet “pranks” affected his fate many years later.

Throwing youth

Studying at St. Petersburg University, moving to Moscow University, then returning back to St. Petersburg are the rash acts of a carefree youth. Throwing between educational institutions of the two capitals ended for Lermontov with a school of guards ensigns and cavalry cadets, where he was forced to enter in 1832. A combination of circumstances, the beliefs of St. Petersburg relatives - and now M. Yu. Lermontov in the cadet school. The romantic period of life is left behind.

The junkers' educational program was quite rich, plus the soldier's drill did not work on freedom-loving young men from we althy families in the best way - and young people spent all their free time from school in childish revelry and revelry. Today, such pampering would be called stress relief, in those years the young psyche was spared less than ours, and Junker being was called nothing more than debauchery.

Years of Lost Opportunities

A young man who wrote his first brilliant poem “Angel” at the age of 17 had to forget about romantic images for a while and become like everyone else. Lermontov, despite his apparent weakness, was incredibly strong in his hands - he bent metal ramrods, tying them into a knot, jokingly. This strength, the ability to easily compose satirical epigrams, the talent of the artist helped Lermontov to be known among the daring junkers for his own. But at the same time, his brothers in the barracks did not need his romantic nonsense - the comrades demanded a different kind of poetry: vulgar, rude, not covered by shame. They needed Junker poems. The Lermontov Encyclopedia was replenished in those years with just such poetry. The aforementioned "Ulansha", "Peterhof Holiday", "Hospital" are nothing but a pornographic representation of the real life of the junkers. Pushkin, respected by Lermontov, also wrote frankly intimate poems, but precisely intimate ones, while Lermontov's poems are vulgar. For two years at school, the poet did not create anything outstanding - in his short life it was a ruthlessly lost time.

The holy is beyond ridicule

Despite the far from decent behavior of the junkers, some moments of Lermontov's biography indicate that the nobility was in the blood of these young people. The poet's grandmother, E. A. Arsenyeva, who adores her Michel, could not leave him alone. Having rented an apartment near the school, she settled a servant in it, whose duties included waking up her nervous and sickly master every morning a few minutes before the school rise, so that the unbearable drumming would not have a bad effect on his psyche, feed him with all sorts of dishes. Comrades who appreciated Lermontov's shameless Junker poems knew about their grandmother's affection for the poet, but this tenderness was never the subject of their ridicule. Incredibly, the young junkers perceived the relationship between their grandson and grandmother almost as a shrine. The poet's contemporaries, all as one, note that they still allowed themselves to play a trick on Lermontov's parents, never on their grandmother.

Contradictions in the assessments of contemporaries

Natives of the Junker school, who by and large went down in history due to the fact that they studied with Lermontov, subsequently give radically different assessments of the poet's relationship with classmates, characterize him differently as a person. And this is also a trace of what Lermontov wrote in those years. He openly laughed at everyone, the names of some are forever linked with his poems and poems of the Junker years. Among them are Tizenhausen, to whom the address of one famous poem is dedicated, Shakhovsky, Polivanov, Prince Baryatinsky … An entire poem is dedicated to the latter!How could he forgive Lermontov's "Hospital", in which the hereditary prince in the cadet school was recognized by the following lines: "And our prince, encouraged by the wine steam, climbed up; pressed the latch - enters with heat, hands on his … holding on. Further narration about the adventures of the prince is even less pleasant. According to the plot, Baryatinsky, dreaming of an intimate meeting with a young maid, in the dark confused her with an old lady and attacked her with all the passion of his youthful impatience. It is unlikely that such fame, which Lermontov's cadet poems provided to the prince, could give birth in his soul to tender memories of joint studies.

Fatal acquaintance at the cadet school

Somewhere in the beginning of 1834 (Lermontov's classmates claim that it was winter) the school decided to publish a handwritten journal "School Dawn". He went out on Wednesdays. All week long, everyone could write whatever they wanted and put their manuscripts in a designated drawer on one of the tables in the dormitory. On Wednesday evenings, these manuscripts were stapled together and immediately read aloud. The most popular author of "School Dawn" was, of course, Lermontov. Junker poems by Mikhail Yuryevich could not be published in real journals, but from the pages of the school weekly they were well known to all the cadets who studied with Lermontov. Another regular contributor to the magazine was none other than Nikolai Martynov, the cursed murderer of the great poet.

In his "Confession", which Martynov wrote after the fatal shot, he tries to explainwhy then in Pyatigorsk he challenged Lermontov to a duel, why he didn’t miss. The grievances he endured from the cadet school left their mark here too - Martynov could not forget the poet's old mockery of himself.

Junker life uncensored

Perhaps Martynov had reason to be offended by Lermontov, but those who are mentioned by name in the poet's works had much more of these reasons. Their names are given above, but some facts from the everyday life of the junkers, conveyed in the poem "Ode to the Outhouse", speak of an even greater ugliness of the behavior of people from noble families. If in the short work “To Tiesenhausen” Lermontov writes harmless: “Do not drive so languidly with your eye, round … do not twist, do not joke with voluptuousness and vice …”, then in “Ode to the outhouse” the poet frankly informs readers about homosexual inclinations common among young men. What Junker poems by Lermontov or poems of those years do without another portion of discrediting revelations? Is it only his "Junker Prayers" - it was they who entered the thin collection of Lermontov's works officially recognized by writers, written by him in those two years (from 1832 to 1834) that the poet spent at school. His frivolous poems were never published, for obvious reasons.

Glory to glory strife

If personal resentment matured and grew in the hearts of some classmates, then frank stories in the light of those whose names were not reflected in the workspoet, played a bad reputation for him on the whole and gave rise to prejudice in the hearts of people who were completely strangers to the poet. Noble fathers of families vigilantly watched so that at balls and secular receptions the vicious poet would not come close to either their daughters or their wives - the glory of the writer of vulgar poems that spilled out of the school did a lot of damage to the author of "A Hero of Our Time". But even Pechorin's appearance on the pages of the capital's magazines did not immediately erase the negative impression in the minds of Russians that Lermontov's Junker poems sowed in them. The poem “Death of a Poet” written on the death of Pushkin somewhat changed the general impression, but the final turn towards true recognition of the work of Mikhail Yuryevich took place only after the release of “A Hero of Our Time”. Many years passed, many events took place before the world "forgot" Lermontov's boyish nonsense.

Not only about everyday life

Lermontov scholars claim that the wonderful poem "Hadji Abrek", as well as one of the editions of "The Demon", were written just during the years of study at the cadet school. The poet's comrades said that quite often, after lights out, Lermontov went to distant classes and wrote there for a long time in complete silence and loneliness. It seems that there were two different Lermontovs at the school: during the day he was an ordinary cadet, not much different from other similar bullies and skeptics (hence his frivolous poems), and at night he turned into himself - thin, vulnerable, full of romanticism and heart feelings. It is believed that Izmail Bey, begun inMoscow, was completed just in the years of study at the cadet school. At the same time, work began on the novel "Vadim", which was never completed. It is gratifying that the Junker poems and poems of Lermontov faded years later against the backdrop of works dedicated to the Caucasus he loved, distant wanderings and wandering, other respectable topics.

Revenge carried through the years

Only two years of schooling lasted, but until the very death of the poet, those frank poetic works followed him on his heels. As already noted, the Junker poems of Lermontov reflected the shameful life of quite real people. And two people from those who studied with the poet at school played fatal roles in his life. These are Martynov (no special explanations are needed here) and Baryatinsky (his hatred of Lermontov only grew over the years). The Caucasus, beloved by the poet, contributed to this.

Lermontov often visited Pyatigorsk, where his grandmother brought him as a child. What was it like for Baryatinsky, who a few years after graduating from school became a field marshal, governor of the Caucasus and close to the emperor himself, to understand that behind his back his subordinates were whispering about his obscene behavior, forever prescribed in the notorious "Hospital"? And then there is Lermontov from time to time looming before my eyes. Of course, Baryatinsky, by the power of his power, harmed the poet's promotion as best he could. Such were the fatal consequences of the Junker pranks.

The best of the last three years

Building early poemsLermontov, written in the first years of conscious creativity, differ in both style and size. They amaze with an almost complete lack of form and an abundance of pompous epithets. From time to time in some poems one can see glimpses of future genius, but literary critics believe that all the best that was created by Lermontov was written by him from 1838 to 1841 - the last in his life. The “Angel” created in 1831 and the “Death of a Poet” created in 1837 stand somewhat apart.

In the last three years, "Mtsyri" appeared, the last (eighth) edition of "Demon", "A Hero of Our Time". Lermontov's talent developed rapidly. How much would he write in the future if not for the shot of a comrade in the cadet school?