The plot of the story by V. Rasputin is built around the preparation for the death of the old woman Anna. Almost all of her children gathered at her bedside. Only her beloved daughter Tatyana, whom her mother affectionately calls Tanchora, did not come.

Anna wants all her children to have time to say goodbye to her. Unexpectedly for those around the old woman it becomes easier. She can already leave the house and eat. Anna's children, who expected the worst, feel bewildered. Sons Ilya and Mikhail decide to get drunk so that the vodka prepared for the commemoration does not “idle”. Intoxicated, the brothers begin to talk about life. It turns out that she has ceased to bring them joy. Work is no longer fun. Hopes for a bright future have long been abandoned, the routine absorbs more and more every day. Mikhail and Ilya love and know how to work. But for some reason, right now, labor does not bring the desired satisfaction. Their sister Lyusya, taking advantage of the fact that her mother has temporarily ceased to need outside help, goes for a walk around the neighborhood. She recalls her childhood and her beloved horse. Having become an adult, the woman left her native places. It seems to Luce that she left something very important in her native village, without which it is impossible to live.

Anna continues to wait for her beloved daughter Tanchora. She is saddened that Tanya did not come. Tanchora was very different from her sisters Vari and Lucy. The beloved daughter had a very kind and gentle character. Without waiting, the old woman decides to die. She does not want to linger in this world. Anna does not find a place for herself in a new life.

Old woman Anna

The old woman lived a long and difficult life. A mother of many children raised her children to be worthy people. She is confident that she has fulfilled her mission to the end.

Anna is the real mistress of her life. And not only life, but also death. The old woman herself made the decision about when she would leave this world. She does not tremble before death, does not beg her to prolong her earthly existence. Anna is waiting for death, like a guest, and does not feel any fear of her.

Old Anna considers children her main asset and pride. The woman does not notice that she has long become indifferent to them. Each of them has his own life, each is busy with himself. Most of all, the old woman is upset by the absence of her beloved daughter Tanchora. Neither the main character nor the reader became aware of the reason why she did not come. Despite everything, Tanya remains her mother's beloved daughter. If she could not come, then there are good reasons for that.

Invisible friend

Death is Anna's invisible and silent companion. The reader feels her presence throughout the story. Anna does not see death as an enemy to hide from or defend against. The old woman managed to make friends with her constant companion.

Death as a natural phenomenon
Death is presented without the slightest horror or tragedy. Her arrival is as natural as the arrival of winter after autumn. This inevitable phenomenon in the life of every person cannot be assessed positively or negatively. Death serves as a conductor between two worlds. Without it, it is impossible to move from one state to another.

The invisible friend shows mercy to those who do not reject or curse her. She agrees to make concessions to each of her new friends. Wise Anna understands this. Friendship with the most terrible phenomenon for every person gives the old woman the right to choose. Anna chooses how to leave this world. Death willingly agrees to come to her in a dream and carefully replace worldly sleep with eternal sleep. The old woman asks for a delay in order to have time to say goodbye to her beloved daughter. Death again yields to the old woman and gives the necessary amount of time.

Despite the fact that every reader understands how the story ends, the author leaves one of the main participants in his work behind the scenes, which further emphasizes the lack of tragedy of death.

Anna's children

Anna's sons and daughters have been living their own lives for a long time. The approaching death of the old woman makes you pay attention to the mother. However, none of the children could hold that attention for too long. Noticing that Anna is getting better, they tend to return to their thoughts and activities. The brothers immediately drink the vodka left for the wake and begin to complain to each other about life. The sisters, who shared the inheritance at the bedside of the dying, disperse in different directions in order to also plunge into their worries.

Anna's children try to conscientiously fulfill their duties to their mother. Lucy is sewing a funeral dress for the old woman. Varvara mourns her mother, as Anna herself wanted. The sons are also ready to do everything necessary to see the old woman on her last journey. In the depths of their souls, each of them is waiting for the moment when the most unpleasant thing will remain in the past and it will be possible to return to their daily affairs and duties. Ilya and Mikhail are not so much saddened by the impending death of their mother as they are concerned about their own. After the departure of their parents, they will become the next generation to die. This thought terrifies the brothers so much that they empty one bottle of vodka after another.

main idea

There are no good or bad events in life. Every event is assessed in some way. Despite her difficult existence, full of suffering and deprivation, Anna does not seek to exaggerate. She intends to leave this world calm and peaceful.

The main theme of the story is the departure from the life of an elderly person, summing up. However, there are other themes in the work that the author prefers to talk about less openly.

Valentin Rasputin wants to tell the reader not only about the personal feelings of the characters. "Deadline", the brief content of which tells only about how each character relates to death, is, first of all, a story about a change in historical eras. Anna and her children watch the destruction of the old order. Collective farms cease to exist. Young people are forced to leave the village due to lack of work, go in search of work in an unknown direction.

The story contains at the heart of the plot the idea of ​​human relationships, mutual assistance and indifference, which are especially clearly manifested in someone else's grief.

Another wonderful work tells about human kindness, fortitude and patience.

Merciless capitalism is coming to replace philanthropic socialism. Former values ​​are depreciated. Anna's sons, accustomed to working for the common good, must now work for the survival of their families. Not accepting the new reality, Ilya and Mikhail try to drown their pain with alcohol. Old Anna feels her superiority over her children. Her death has already come to her and is only waiting for an invitation to enter the house. Mikhail, Ilya, Lusya, Varvara and Tatyana are young. They will have to live for a long time in an unfamiliar world for them, which is so unlike the one in which they were once born. They will have to become different people, abandon their former ideals, so as not to perish in the new reality. None of Anna's four children is willing to change. Only Tanchora's opinion remains unknown to the reader.

People's dissatisfaction with a new life is not able to change the course of events. The ruthless hand of history will put everything in its place. The younger generation is obliged to adapt in order to educate their offspring differently than they were raised themselves. The old generation will not be able to accept the new rules of the game. He will have to leave this world.

5 (100%) 2 votes

The story "Last Term"

The story "Deadline", which Rasputin himself called the main of his books, touched on many moral problems and vices of society.

The story is about life and death. Nature provides for it in such a way that the decisive fact of life - the birth of a person - forever remains secret and unknown to him: no one knows and does not remember his birth, does not know and does not remember his early infancy, death is a conscious fact.

Almost every adult, especially an elderly person, at least once looked into the face of his death, felt its obvious closeness under some extreme circumstances. And if a person cannot apply birth to himself, then alien death is applicable to each of us ... Few have traced it so carefully over many pages, as Rasputin did in The Deadline.

“The old woman Anna lay on a narrow iron bed near the Russian stove and waited for death, the time for which had already come, the old woman was close to eighty,” the story begins. "In the night the old woman died" - so it ends.

The main character of the story is the old woman Anna. She was already eighty years old. The only goal left in her life is to see all her children before her death and go to the next world with a clear conscience. Anna is not afraid to die, moreover, she is ready for this last step, because she is already tired, she feels that she has “been exhausted to the very bottom, boiled away to the last drop” (“Eighty years, apparently, is still a lot for one person if she worn out to the point that now you just take it and throw it away ...”). And no wonder that she was tired - her whole life was running, on her feet, in work, in worries: children, a house, a garden, a field, a collective farm ...

And now the time has come when there was no strength left at all, except to say goodbye to the children. Anna could not imagine how she could leave forever without seeing them, without saying farewell words to them, without finally hearing their native voices.

Anna's children are typical representatives of modern society, people who are busy, have a family, a job, but for some reason very rarely remember their mother. Their mother suffered a lot and missed them, and when the time came to die, only for the sake of them she remained for a few more days in this world and she would have lived as long as she wanted, if only they were near.

“In her life, the old woman gave birth to many, but now she has only five survivors. It turned out so because at first death got into the habit of going to their family, like a ferret to a chicken coop, then the war began. But five survived: three daughters and two sons. One daughter lived in the region, the other in the city, and the third and very far away - in Kyiv. The eldest son from the north, where he remained after the army, also moved to the city, and the youngest, Mikhail, who alone of all did not leave the village, had an old woman and lived out her life ... "

It was he, Mikhail, who informed everyone by telegrams that his mother was bad and that they should come: you never know what could happen.

And they came - to bury: Varvara, Ilya and Lucy tuned in just for this, temporarily dressing their thoughts in clothes appropriate for the occasion and covering the mirrors of the soul with the dark fabric of the upcoming parting. Each of them, of course, loved his mother in his own way, but they all equally lost the habit of her, separated long ago, and what connected them with her and with each other has already turned into something conventional, accepted by the mind, but not touching the soul. They were obliged to come to the funeral, and they fulfilled this obligation.

But Anna, being “either at the very end of life, or at the very beginning of death,” was waiting for them alive; Because and lived still, that waited. She set a deadline for herself, and her body, following the last will and knowing that to wait is the only effort that is now required of it, it is not known where it drew the energy needed only for breathing and for the intermittent work of thought. All the main things for which it was created and existed, “if a person comes into the world for this, so that the world will never become poor without people and never grow old without children,” was fulfilled long ago. The children, with the exception of Tatyana, who lives far away, have arrived, gathered, and are waiting.

Old Anna lies motionless, without opening her eyes; she almost froze, but life is still glimmering. Daughters realize this by bringing a piece of a broken mirror to their lips. It fogs up, so mom is still alive. However, Varvara, one of Anna's daughters, considers it possible already to mourn, "to rebuke her", which she selflessly does first at the bedside, then at the table, "where it is more convenient." Daughter Lyusya at this time sews a mourning dress tailored back in the city. The sewing machine chirps to the beat of Varvarin's sobs.

And Anna, already with one foot in the other world, managed to find the strength in herself to be reborn, to flourish, and all for the sake of her children. “By a miracle it happened or not by a miracle, no one will say, only when she saw her guys, the old woman began to come to life.”

And what are they - children? And they solve their problems, and it seems that their mother does not really care, and if they are interested in her, it's only for decency. And they all live only for decency. Do not offend anyone, do not scold, do not say too much - all for decency, so as not worse than others. Gathering around the old woman on the morning of the day following the arrival, the children, seeing their mother revived, do not know how to react to her strange rebirth.

Each of them goes about his own business in difficult days for the mother, and the state of the mother worries them little. Mikhail and Ilya fell into drunkenness, Lusya walks, Varvara solves her problems, and none of them had the idea to devote more time to their mother, talk to her, just sit next to her. All their concern for their mother began and ended with the "semolina porridge", which they all rushed to cook. Everyone gave advice, criticized others, but no one did anything himself. From the very first meeting of these people, disputes and abuse begin between them. And so the days passed: constant arguments and swearing, resentment against each other and drunkenness.

Anna was waiting for the children, feeling an urgent inner need to bless them on a further path in life; the children hurried to her, striving to fulfill their external duty as carefully as possible. Invisible and, perhaps, even unconscious in its entirety, this conflict of worldview in the story finds its expression, first of all, in the system of images. It is not given to children who have grown up to understand the tragedy of the fracture revealed by them and the impending break - so what can you do if it is not given? Rasputin finds out why it happened, why are they like that?

“Mikhail and Ilya, having brought vodka, now did not know what to do with them: everything else seemed trifles compared to this, they toiled, as if passing every minute through themselves.” Having huddled in the barn, they get drunk almost without a snack, except for the products that Mikhail Ninka's little daughter carries for them. This causes a legitimate female gay, but the first shots of vodka give the peasants a feeling of a genuine holiday. After all, the mother is alive. Ignoring the girl collecting empty and unfinished bottles, they no longer understand what thought they want to drown out this time, maybe it's fear. “The fear from the consciousness that the mother is about to die is not like all the previous fears that fall to them in life, because this fear is the worst of all, it comes from death ... It seemed that death had already noticed them all in the face and no longer will forget."

Having drunk thoroughly and feeling the next day as if they had been put through a meat grinder, Mikhail and Ilya thoroughly get drunk the next day. “But how not to drink? says Michael. - Laziness, the second, let even a week - it is still possible. What if you don't drink until you die? Just think, there is nothing ahead. All the same. How many ropes hold us both at work and at home, that you can’t gasp, so much you had to do and didn’t do, everything must, must, must, must, and the farther, the more you must - it’s all gone to hell. And I drank, as soon as I got free, I did everything that was necessary. And what he didn’t do, he shouldn’t have done, and he did the right thing, what he didn’t do. This does not mean that Mikhail and Ilya do not know how to work and have never known any other joy, except from drunkenness. In the village where they all once lived together, there was a common work - “friendly, inveterate, sonorous, with a dissonance of saws and axes, with a desperate hoot of fallen woods, resounding in the soul with enthusiastic anxiety with the obligatory joking with each other. Such work happens once during the firewood harvesting season - in the spring, so that they have time to dry over the summer, yellow pine logs, pleasant to the eye, with a thin silky skin, lie down in neat woodpile. These Sundays are organized for themselves, one family helps another, which is still possible now. But the collective farm in the village is falling apart, people are leaving for the city, there is no one to feed and raise livestock.

Remembering her former life, the townswoman Lusya with great warmth and joy imagines her beloved horse Igrenka, on which “slap a mosquito, it will fall down”, which in the end happened: the horse died. Igren dragged a lot, but did not manage. Wandering around the village through the fields and arable land, Lucy realizes that she does not choose where she goes, that she is being guided by some outsider who lives in these places and confesses her power. ... It seemed that life came back, because she, Lucy, forgot something here, lost something very valuable and necessary for her, without which it is impossible ...

While the children are drinking and reminiscing, the old woman Anna, having eaten the children's semolina porridge specially cooked for her, cheers up even more and goes out onto the porch. She is hung by a long-awaited friend Mironikha. “Ochi-mochi! Are you, old woman, alive? Mironikha says. “Why doesn’t death take you? .. I’m going to her wake, I think she chided like a kind one, but she’s still here.”

Anna grieves that Tatyana, Tanchora, as she calls her, is not among the children gathered at her bedside. Tanchora was not like any of the sisters. She stood as if between them with her special character, soft and joyful, human. The old woman was waiting for her daughter to arrive, but she, unfortunately, did not come, and then “something suddenly broke in the old woman, something burst with a short groan.” Of all the children, only Michael was able to understand what was happening with his mother, and he took sin upon his soul. “Your Tanchora will not arrive, and there is nothing to wait for her. I beat off a telegram to her so that she would not come, ”overpowering himself, he puts an end to it. And this act of his cruel mercy is worth hundreds of unnecessary words.

So without waiting for her daughter, the old woman decides to die. Anna prayed: “Lord, let me go, I will go. Send my death to the mine, I'm ready. She had nothing more to do in this world and there was no need to postpone death. While the guys are here, let them bury, carry out, as usual with people, so that another time they do not return to this concern. Then, you see, Tanchora will come ...

The old woman thought about death many times and knew it as herself. She imagined her own death, the “mortal mother”, as the same ancient, emaciated old woman. In recent years, they have become girlfriends, the old woman often talked to her, and death, sitting somewhere on the sidelines, listened to her reasonable whisper and sighed understandingly. They agreed that the old woman would leave at night, first fall asleep, like all people, so as not to frighten death with open eyes, then she would gently snuggle up, take off her short worldly sleep and give her eternal rest. That's how it all comes out.

Rasputin's heroine foresees her own departure to the "far side" with amazing poetic clarity, in all its stages and details. Leaving, Anna remembers her children in those moments when they expressed all the best in themselves: young Ilya very seriously, with faith, accepts a mother's blessing before leaving for the front; Varvara, who grew up to be such a whiny, unhappy woman, is seen in early childhood digging a hole in the ground just to see what is in it, “looking for what no one else knows in her”, Lucy desperately, with her whole being, rushes from the departing steamer towards mother, leaving home; Michael, stunned by the birth of his first child, is suddenly pierced by an understanding of the unbreakable chain of generations in which he threw on a “new ring”.

And Anna remembered herself at the most wonderful moment of her life: “She is not an old woman - no, she is still a girl, and everything around her is young, bright, beautiful. She wanders along the shore along the warm, steamy river after the rain ... And it’s so good, happy for her to live at this moment in the world, to look with her own eyes at its beauty, to be in the midst of a stormy and joyful, consonant in everything action of eternal life, that it makes her dizzy and sweetly, excitedly whines in her chest.

Having told about the life and death of a simple Russian woman, the writer brought us closer to the discreet luminous beauty from within the Russian folk character. Anna dies long and hard. The forces either completely leave her, then suddenly return again, having deceived, at least for a short time, death standing by the bed. During this period, her past and present arise in Anna's mind, her whole life passes before us, the life of a person with a deeply individual and at the same time so typical of her generation, for the entire post-revolutionary peasantry, the female fate.

In Anna's internal monologues, in her continuous thoughts, when every judgment, every scene is as if washed by the purity and disinterestedness of the last, dying feeling, the voice of wisdom, kindness and forgiveness is heard here - especially when three of the children leave their mother on the very eve of her death. .. Yes, forgiveness and hope, gained through suffering by one's own life, which came to an end and in which there was everything: birth and death, separation, joy, letters, expectations and meetings. Everyday and forever poetic work that created everything around her...

Having set a philosophical mood from the very beginning of the work, communicated by the mere presence of death next to a person, Valentin Rasputin, without lowering this level when it comes to not about Anna, but, perhaps, drawing subtle psychologism from philosophical richness, creates portraits of children old women, with each new page bringing them to filigree. One gets the impression that with this scrupulous work, with this recreation of the smallest details of their faces and characters, he delays the death of the old woman in itself: she cannot die until the reader sees with her own eyes, to the last wrinkle, those whom she gave birth to, whom she was proud of. who, finally, remains instead of her on Earth and will continue her in time. So they coexist in the story, Anna's thoughts and the actions of her children, now - occasionally - approaching, almost to the point of contact, then - more often - diverging to invisible distances. The tragedy is not that they do not understand it, but that it never occurs to them that they really do not understand.

Not for the sake of the death of the old woman Anna, the story “The Deadline” was written, but for the sake of the living, this long death was needed to fully show the characters of each of Anna’s children, each of the living surrounded by the dying. And the vicissitudes of death are the vicissitudes of their lives, their relationship to each other.

In this story, Rasputin very well showed the relationship of the modern family and their shortcomings, which are clearly manifested at critical moments, revealed the moral problems of society, showed the callousness and selfishness of people, their loss of all respect and the usual feeling of love for each other. They, native people, are mired in anger and envy. They care only about their own interests, problems, only their own affairs. They do not find time even for close and dear people: they did not find time for their mother - the most dear person.

Old Anna lies motionless, without opening her eyes; she almost froze, but life is still glimmering. The daughters understand this by raising a piece of the broken mirror to their lips. It fogs up, which means that mom is still alive. However, Varvara, one of Anna's daughters, considers it possible already to mourn, "reply her", which she selflessly does first at the bedside, then at the table, "where it is more convenient." Daughter Lucy at this time sews a mourning dress tailored in the city. The sewing machine stre-kochet to the beat of Varvara's sobs.

Anna is the mother of five children, her two sons died, the first ones, born one for God, the other for a guy. Varvara came to say goodbye to her mother from the district center, Lusya and Ilya from nearby provincial towns.

Can't wait for Anna Tanya from far away Kyiv. And next to her in the village was always her son Mikhail, along with his wife and daughter. Gathering around the old woman on the morning of the next day after the arrival of the day, the children, seeing the awakened mother, do not know how to react to her strange resurrection.

“Mikhail and Ilya, having brought vodka, now did not know what to do with them: everything else, in comparison with this, seemed like nothing to them, they toiled, as if passing every minute through themselves.” Having huddled in the barn, they get drunk almost without a snack, except for the products that Mikhail Ninka's little daughter carries for them. This causes legitimate female anger, but the first shots of vodka give the peasants a feeling of a genuine holiday. After all, the mother is alive. Ignoring the girl who collects empty and half-drunk bottles, they no longer understand what thought they want to drown out this time, maybe it's fear. “The fear from the consciousness that the mother is about to die is not like all the previous fears that fall out to them in life, because this fear is the worst of all, it comes from death ... It seemed that death had already noticed them all in the face and will no longer forget.

Having drunk thoroughly and feeling the next day as if they had been passed through a meat-cutting machine, Mikhail and Ilya will fundamentally get drunk on the next day. “But how not to drink? Mikhail says. - A day, a second, even a week - it is still possible. What if you don't drink until you die? Just think, there is nothing ahead. All the same. How many ropes hold us both at work and at home, that you can’t gasp, so much you had to do and didn’t do, everything must, must, must, must, and the farther, the more you have to - it’s all gone to hell. And I drank, as soon as I got free, I did everything that was necessary. And what he didn’t do, he shouldn’t have done, and he did the right thing, what he didn’t do. This does not mean that Mikhail and Ilya do not know how to work and have never known any other joy, except from drunkenness. In the village where they once lived together, there was a common work - “friendly, inveterate, sonorous, with a different variety of saws and axes, with a desperate hoot of fallen woods, reviews -whispering in the soul with enthusiastic anxiety with the obligatory podshu-chi-va-ing with each other. Such work happens once during the firewood harvesting season - in the spring, so that they have time to dry out over the summer, yellow pine logs, pleasant to the eye, with a thin silky skin, lie down in neat logs. These Sundays are arranged for themselves, one family helps another, which is possible even now. But the collective farm in the village is falling apart, people are leaving for the city, there is no one to feed and raise livestock.

Remembering her former life, the townswoman Lucy with great warmth and joy imagines her beloved horse Igrenka, on which “slap a mosquito, it will fall”, which in the end happened : the horse is dead. Igren dragged a lot, but did not manage. Wandering around the village through the fields and arable land, Lucy realizes that she does not choose where she should go, that she is being guided by some outsider who lives in these places and uses her power . ... It seemed that life came back, because she, Lucy, forgot something here, lost something very valuable and necessary for her, without which it is impossible ...

While the children drink and indulge in reminiscences, the old woman Anna, having eaten the children's semolina porridge specially cooked for her, shakes up even more and goes out onto the porch. She is hung by the long-awaited friend Miro-niha. “Ochi-mochi! Are you, old woman, alive? Miro-niha says. “Why doesn’t death take you? .. I’m going to her wake, I think she nailed it like a kind one, but she’s still here.”

Anna grieves that Tatyana, Tanchora, as she calls her, is not among the children gathered at her bedside. Tanchora was not like any of the sisters. She stood as if between them with her special character, soft and joyful, human. And without waiting for her daughter, the old woman decides to die. “There was nothing more for her to do in this world, and there was no need to postpone death. While the guys are here, let them bury them, spend it, as usual with people, so that they don’t have to return to this concern another time. Then, you see, Tanchora will come too... The old woman thought about death many times and knew her as herself. In recent years, they have become friends, the old woman often talked to her, and death, sitting somewhere aside, listened to her reasonable whisper and sighed understandingly . They agreed that the old woman would leave at night, first fall asleep, like all people, so as not to frighten death with open eyes, then she would gently snuggle up, take off her short worldly sleep and give her eternal rest. That's how it all comes out.

Valentin Grigoryevich Rasputin has long been recognized by the public and has earned the title of one of the best village writers. The main problem that the writer raised in his work was the destructive attitude of man to nature and the loss of moral values ​​under the influence of civilization. Rasputin remained true to his priorities in the story "Deadline". We will consider a brief summary of this work.

Creativity Rasputin

Valentin Rasputin is a writer who knows how to convey the national spirit of his people, working within the framework of the traditional school of Russian literature. This is what he has earned recognition both at home and abroad.

Rasputin owes his love for nature and understanding of its subtle beauty to the place of his birth (the native village of the writer was located on the banks of the Angara River). The prose writer has always seen the preservation of natural resources and the spiritual morality of people as the task of his work, because the connection between man and nature is inseparable.

The themes of morality and the relationship of man with nature are reflected in the story "The Deadline". Rasputin reduced the summary of this work to the eternal problem of life and death.

Theme of the story

The fundamental theme on which the entire narrative is built was the problem of morality, or rather its modern understanding. Rasputin considered this story to be the most important in his work. The "Deadline" (a summary of the chapters can be read below) reflected the changes taking place in the thoughts and soul of modern man.

But the theme of the story is much wider and more diverse, it is not limited to one thing. Rasputin raises the following issues in the work: relationships between relatives, old age, causes of alcoholism, attitude to honor and conscience, fear of death.

Rasputin's idea

Rasputin sees the main task of his story "Deadline" in exposing the moral decline of modern society. With the advent of progress, the souls of modern people began to take possession of selfishness, heartlessness, cruelty and callousness. Rasputin wanted to draw the attention of his readers to this. Modern man has lost touch with his roots and nature, has lost the meaning of life, moral guidelines, spiritual wealth.

Anna's image

If we briefly describe the "Deadline", Rasputin Valentin appears as a writer fighting for the preservation of the human soul. And representatives of the older generation become an example of worthy people in his works.

Anna is a dying old woman, but she is not afraid of death. She lived a decent life, was a good mother, was happy, and there were sorrows in her life, but she takes them for granted. The main character is endowed with incredible moral strength, which stems from Anna's belief that a person should be responsible for the life they live.

The image of Anna is idealized by the writer, who sees in ordinary women incredible spiritual strength, the ability to be a real mother and a worthy person.

"Deadline" (Rasputin): summary

Anna is an old woman, life is barely glimmering in her, she is no longer even able to move. Daughters, in order to check if their mother is dead, bring a mirror to her face. Varvara, one of Anna's daughters, considers it possible to start mourning her dying mother, and another daughter, Lucy, is already sewing a black dress.

Anna has five children, but now she has only Varvara, Lyusya and Ilya, and her son Mikhail, who lives in the same village with her mother. The main character is waiting for the arrival of Tanya, who lives in Kyiv. As soon as all the children, except for Tatyana, gather around the dying woman, she seems to be reborn, and the children immediately fall into bewilderment.

The men, not knowing what to do, go to the barn and get drunk there. Gradually, they are seized with fun - the mother is still alive. But the more they drink, the more fear seizes them - the fear of losing Anna, the fear of inevitable death: "death has already noticed everyone in the face and will not forget."

The summary of the book "Deadline" by the author Valentin Rasputin can be continued with a scene describing the next morning. Ilya and Mikhail do not feel well, and in order to get rid of this condition, they decide to get drunk. They compare drinking with gaining freedom, because in a drunken state nothing is holding them back: neither home nor work. They did not always find solace in alcohol, there were days when the collective farm existed, when the whole village worked on the preparation of firewood. Such work was to their liking and brought pleasure.

Lucy also remembers her former life. Previously, the family had a horse - Igren, whom the girl loved very much, but he died from hard overwork. Wandering around the surrounding fields, Lucy recalls that earlier she seemed to feel some direction in her life, as if someone's hand was guiding her, but in the city this feeling disappeared. Rasputin put a lot of thoughts about the former well-being into the story "Deadline". In the words of the heroes, one can hear the cry for an irrevocable life, when everyone lived in harmony with each other and nature.

Anna gradually comes to life and is already able to get up on her own and go out onto the porch. She comes to visit her friend Mironikha. But the old woman's heart is still full of sadness because Tanya won't come. Tanchora, as her own people called her, differed from her brothers and sisters in her gentle human character. But the daughter does not go, and Anna decides to die. In recent years, the old woman has come to terms with the inevitable and even made friends with death. She arranges with her to take her in a dream. That's how everything happens.

Conclusion

So, the story "The Deadline" (Rasputin), a summary of which we have given above, is a vivid illustration of the writer's work and the key to understanding his moral and spiritual ideals. The greatest value of Rasputin, therefore, is the homeland and the connection of a person with his roots.

The story "Deadline" by Rasputin was written in 1970. In his book, the author reveals the themes of the spiritual and moral fall of man. The work shows how selfishness, callousness, heartlessness that have taken possession of people's lives and souls affect not only the fate of a particular person, but also society as a whole.

main characters

Anna- an old woman, a mother of five children, a kind, hardworking, caring woman.

Other characters

barbarian- the eldest daughter, a simple village woman, exhausted by a hard life and frequent childbirth.

Lucy- Anna's daughter, a city dweller, educated, demanding of herself and people.

Ilya- the middle son, also a resident of the city.

Michael- the youngest son, with whom Anna lives; indecisive, irresponsible, big drinker.

Tatiana- Anna's youngest child, a kind and affectionate woman.

Mironikha Anna's best friend.

Nadia and Nina- Anna's daughter-in-law and her little granddaughter.

Chapter 1

The old woman Anna, who was already close to eighty, "waited for death, the time for which seemed ripe." She held on to the last of her strength, but three years ago she "gave up and took to her bed."

During her life, Anna gave birth to many children, but “she only had five left alive” - two sons and three daughters. Everyone, except for the youngest son Mikhail, left the village, and it was with him that "the old woman lived out her life." When it became clear that from day to day she would leave the world for another, Mikhail sent telegrams to his brother and sisters to come.

The eldest Varvara arrived first, followed by the “city residents – Ilya and Lusya”, and everyone was waiting for Tatyana from Kyiv. The mother was very ill, and Varvara began to mourn her during her lifetime, and Lucy sat down to sew mourning clothes.

Chapters 2-3

Realizing that there would be no vodka in the store on pay day, the brothers prudently decided to buy alcohol for their mother's funeral - at least one box, because "half the village will come."

Unexpectedly for everyone, Anna opened her eyelids, called the children who had gathered near her by name. Upon learning that Tatyana had not yet arrived, the woman again fell into oblivion.

“Little by little the old woman straightened out,” and by evening she asked for liquid semolina. The joy that she sees "her guys, did not let her rest, fought in the face, moved her arms, chest, clogged her throat." Anna was very weak, it was difficult for her to speak, and she only looked lovingly at the children - "greedily, hastily, as if forever absorbing every face."

While straightening her mother's bed, Lucy noticed that she was sleeping on dirty sheets that had not been washed for a long time. She began to reprimand Mikhail for such indifference, not noticing how thickly Nadya, her brother's wife, "blushed." To which Anna began to defend her daughter-in-law, who had patiently looked after her all this time. The woman admitted that it was much harder for her with Mikhail when he drinks, and he was in this state regularly. Lucy promised to talk to her brother.

Overjoyed that his mother was recovering, Ilya and Mikhail decided to have a drink.

Chapters 4-5

The next morning, Anna tried to sit up on her own, and succeeded. At dawn, Ninka, the young daughter of Mikhail, stomped to her, and warmed herself near her grandmother.

Anna asked Varvara, who had a bad dream, to run to Mironikha, an old neighbor, and visit her.

Mikhail woke up, who the other day with Ilya drank three bottles of vodka. With a hangover, he was afraid that he and his brother had drunk the whole box, but, looking into the pantry, Mikhail “wrinkled happily” - the untouched bottles were in place.

Prudently hiding one bottle of vodka in the chicken coop, Mikhail woke up his brother, and they began to complain to each other about how hard it is to deal with a hangover with age. However, this did not prevent the brothers from drinking a bottle of vodka before breakfast, while they are not seen by women.

Alcohol unleashed the tongues of drinking companions, and they began to lament that the mother did not die in time, when "everyone gathered, got ready."

Chapter 7

On reflection, Lucy decided to go for a walk in the forest. She "did not want to see anyone, talk to anyone - neither pity nor cheer." Looking at familiar landscapes, Lucy recalled her carefree childhood, youth - "how strange and how far it was, as if not with her."

Finally, she reached the field, which was the goal of her walk. Once, in the post-war famine, Lucy was sent to harrow this field, highlighting the stallion Igrenka, exhausted by hard work and eternal malnutrition. During work, he suddenly fell and could not get up. From fear, Lucy began to beat the horse, and then ran after her mother.

Upon learning of the trouble, Anna immediately rushed to the aid of Igrenka. With affectionate perseverance, she helped the stallion to get up, who understood her perfectly. That saved him from certain death.

Walking “through the places that most clearly marked her former village life”, Lucy clearly realized that she had forgotten a lot, and a lot was gone forever ...

Chapters 8-11

Anna was visited by her old girlfriend, the lively and restless Mironikha, who always enjoyed teasing her neighbor. They gladly savored all the village gossip. Looking at Anna, Mironikha thought about how “it would be good for them and the old woman to die at one o’clock, so that no one would be left for later.”

Mikhail and Ilya went into a deep binge. Soon their neighbor Stepan made up the company, and now "Michael was no longer afraid of either Satan or his wife."

Anna was very glad that the children had gathered near her, but her mother's heart was haunted by thoughts of Tanchor, the youngest daughter Tatyana. She had not seen her for a long time - Tatyana married a military man who was "transferred" from city to city, and soon the couple settled in distant Kyiv.

Tanchora was "the last one, scraping" and "grew more affectionate than her sisters." At first, it was unusual for Anna to receive so much love, so much tenderness from her daughter, and in response her heart overflowed with gratitude and inexpressible joy.

When Anna realized that there was no point in waiting for Tatiana any longer, something “suddenly broke” in her. The children tried to calm her down, but the old woman was crying unabated - she was sure that something had happened to Tatyana.

"That same night, without delay," Anna decided to die. She remembered all the relatives who had gone to another world, all her children, who were never destined to live in this world. Anna believed that she was already delayed, but she had someone to go to. "In the night the old woman died" ...

Conclusion

In his work, Valentin Rasputin raises the problem of forgetting one's origins, one's roots. People chained in the shell of their own egoism and indifference are losing the rich spiritual heritage of their ancestors.

After reading the short retelling of "Deadline", we recommend that you read Rasputin's story in full.

Story test

Check the memorization of the summary with the test:

Retelling rating

Average rating: 4.5. Total ratings received: 191.