Ivan Aleksandrovich Goncharov worked on the novel Oblomov for ten years. The characterization of the protagonist is so convincingly presented by the classic that he went beyond the scope of the work, and the image became a household word. The quality of the author's work on the characters of the story is impressive. All of them are solid, possessing the features of modern people writer.
The theme of this article is the characterization of the heroes of Oblomov.
Ilya Ilyich Oblomov. Slip on the plane of laziness
The central image of the book is the young (32-33 years old) landowner Ilya Ilyich Oblomov, a lazy imposing dreamer. He is a man of medium height, with dark gray eyes, nice features, childishly pampered puffy hands. Oblomov lives in a St. Petersburg apartment on the Vyborg side . The characteristics of this person are ambiguous. Oblomov is a great conversationalist. He is by nature not capable of doing harm to anyone. His soul is pure. Educated, has a broad horizons. At any given time, his face reflects a continuous stream of thoughts. It would seem that we are talking about a successful person, if not for the huge laziness that had settled in Ilya Ilyich. Since childhood, numerous nannies took care of him in detail. "Zaharka da Vani" of the serfs did any, even small work for him. In idleness and lying on the couch his days pass.
He is naive to such an extent that in the end he turns out to be deceived and ruined by crooks: Mikhey Tarantyev and Ivan Matveevich Mukhoyarov. Mikhey Tarantyev is a forty-year-old healthy man, a typical “bred,” “master of speaking,” parasitic character in society. Convinced by the rogue, Oblomov leaves the apartment and returns to Oblomovka. Tarantiev is a “fraudster” fraud, while listening to him, everything seems “clear and understandable” to the victim, but only it comes to practical execution, as Tarantiev does not work. Then he handed over the "warm little client" to his accomplice. Ivan Matveevich Mukhoyarov is made from another test. This is a rogue practitioner. His craft is fraud, vilely composed, ruining documents.
Trusting him, Oblomov signed a bonded contract for his Vyborg apartment, and then paid linden "moral damage" to his brother Agafya Mukhoyarov in the amount of ten thousand rubles by means of a fake loan letter. A friend of Ilya Ilyich Shtolts exposes villains. After that, Tarantyev "starts on the run."
People close to Oblomov
People around him feel that he is a spiritual person, Oblomov. A characteristic is a characteristic, but the self-destruction of the main character by laziness does not prevent him from having friends. The reader sees how a real friend Andrei Shtolts is trying to wrest Oblomov out of the tight embrace of doing nothing. After Oblomov’s death, he became, according to the will of the latter, the adoptive father for the son of Andryusha.
Oblomov has a devoted and loving common-law spouse - the widow Agafya Pshenitsyna - an unsurpassed mistress, not far-sighted, illiterate, but honest and decent. Outwardly, she is full, but okay, hardworking. Ilya Ilyich admires her, comparing with a cheesecake. A woman breaks all relations with her brother Ivan Mukhoyarov, learning about the low swindle by him of her husband. After the death of a civil husband, a woman feels that "her soul was taken out of her." Having given his son to be brought up by the Stolts, Agafya just wants to leave after his Ilya. She is not interested in money, as can be seen from her refusal of the income due from Oblomov’s estate.
Ilya Ilyich is served by Zakhar - untidy, lazy, but idolizing his master and devoted to the end a servant of the old school. After the death of the master, the former servant prefers to beggar, but is near his grave.
Read more about the image of Andrei Stolz
Often the theme of school essays is a comparative description of Oblomov and Stolz. They are opposite even in appearance. Slender, dark-skinned, with sunken cheeks, it seems that Stolz is entirely composed of muscles and tendons. He has a civil service, a rank, a guaranteed income. Later, working in a trading company, he earned to buy a house. He is active and creative, he is offered interesting and monetary work. It was he, in the second part of the novel, who was trying to bring Oblomov to Olga Ilyinskaya, introducing them. However, Oblomov stopped in building relations with this lady, because he was afraid to change housing and engage in active work. Disappointed Olga, who was planning to re-educate the lazy person, left him. However, the image of Stolz is not ideal, despite his constant creative work. He, as the opposite of Oblomov, is afraid to dream. In this image, Goncharov invested with excess rationality and rationalism. The writer believed that the image of Stolz was not finalized by him. Anton Pavlovich Chekhov even considered this image negative, motivating this judgment by the fact that he was “too pleased with himself” and “thinks too well of himself”.
Olga Ilyinskaya - a woman of the future
The image of Olga Ilyinskaya is strong, complete, beautiful. Not a beauty, but surprisingly harmonious and dynamic. She is deeply spiritual and at the same time active. Ilya Oblomov met with her, singing the aria "Casta diva". This woman was able to stir up even such a pentuch. But Oblomov’s re-education turned out to be a super-difficult task, not more effective than training woodpeckers, laziness deeply rooted in him. In the end, Oblomov refuses the first relationship (due to laziness) with Olga. A characteristic of their further relationship is Olga's active sympathy. She marries an active, reliable and loyal Andrey Stoltz who has fallen in love with her. They have a wonderful harmonious family. But the discerning reader will understand that an active German "does not get" to the level of his wife’s spiritual beginning.
Output
A string of Goncharovsky images passes before the eyes of the reader of the novel. Of course, the most striking of them is the image of Ilya Ilyich Oblomov. Having wonderful prerequisites for a successful, comfortable life, he managed to ruin himself. At the end of his life, the landowner realized what had happened to him after all, giving this phenomenon the capacious laconic name “Oblomovism”. Is it modern? And how. Today's Ilya Ilyich have, in addition to the flight of dreams, also impressive resources - computer games with stunning graphics.
The image of Andrei Stolz was not disclosed by the novel to the extent conceived by Ivan Alexandrovich Goncharov. The author of the article considers this to be natural. After all, the classic portrayed two extremes in these heroes. The first is a futile dream, and the second is a pragmatic, unspiritualised activity. Obviously, only by combining these qualities in the right proportion will we get something harmonious.