"The drama is in a hurry ..." - Goethe.

The issue of drama is an object of close attention not only to literary critics, but also to language teachers, psychologists, methodologists, and theater critics.

Art critic I. Vishnevskaya believes that "it is drama that will help to analyze time and fate, historical events and human characters more deeply." Emphasizing the deep connection between dramaturgy and the theater, Vishnevskaya states that "the dramaturgy of the theater, cinema, television, and radio is the life of a modern schoolchild." This fact is probably the reason why many students often know the content of dramatic (and sometimes epic) works only from television performances or screen adaptations.

M. Gromova, a researcher of the poetics of dramatic works, who has created a number of textbooks on dramaturgy containing interesting literary material, believes that undeservedly little attention is paid to the study of dramatic works.

Also known is the textbook of the famous scientist of the Moscow methodological school Z.S. Smelkova, which presents extensive material on dramaturgy. Considering dramaturgy as an interspecies art form, Z. Smelkova emphasizes the stage purpose of the drama, which “lives in the theater and takes on a complete form only when it is staged”.

As for methodological aids and developments, there are very few of them today. Suffice it to name the works "Literature of the XX century" in two parts by V. Agenosov, "Russian Literature" by R.I. Albetkova, Russian Literature. Grade 9 ”,“ Russian literature 10-11th grades ”by A.I. Gorshkova and many others.

The history of the development of dramaturgy gives us many examples when dramatic works never saw a scene during the life of the author (remember A.S. Griboedov’s “Woe from Wit”, M.Yu. Lermontov’s “Masquerade”), or were distorted by censorship, or were staged in truncated form. Many plays by A.P. Chekhov were incomprehensible to modern theaters and were interpreted opportunistically, in the spirit of the requirements of the times.

Therefore, today the question is ripe to talk not only about drama, but also about the theater, about staging plays on the theater stage.

From this it becomes quite clear that the drama:

• - firstly, one of the genera (along with epic and lyrics) and one of the main genres of literature (along with tragedy and comedy), requiring special study;
• - secondly, the drama should be studied in two aspects: literary criticism and theatrical art (the main task of our book).

The study of drama is conditioned by the requirements of standard curricula in literature intended for students of schools, academic lyceums and vocational colleges. The objectives of the training programs are aimed at the formation of knowledge, skills and abilities to analyze a work of art and to educate true connoisseurs of art.

It is quite natural that students can find interesting, scientific and cognitive information in the Hegelian “Aesthetics” (, in the work of V. G. Belinsky “On Drama and Theater”, in the studies of A. Anixt “Drama Theory in Russia from Pushkin to Chekhov”, A. A. Karyagina Karyagin A. "Drama - as an aesthetic problem", V. A. Sakhnovsky-Pankeeva "Drama. Conflict. Composition. Stage life", V. V. Khalizeva "Drama - as a phenomenon of art", "Drama as kind of literature" (and many others.

It is also quite natural that today there are few teaching aids that raise the problem of students' perception of dramatic works in the aspect of theatrical art.

To some extent, the lack is made up for by modern textbooks and teaching aids on the theory of literature by V.V. Agenosova, E.Ya. Fesenko, V.E. Khalizeva and others, who rightly believe that a play cannot have a full life without a theater. Just as a play cannot “live” without a performance, so the performance gives an “open” life to the play.

Literary critic E.Ya. Fesenko considers the reflection of the essential content of life “through systems of contradictory, conflicting relations between subjects directly realizing their interests and goals” to be a distinctive feature of the drama, which are expressed and realized in action. The main means of its embodiment in dramatic works, according to the author, is the speech of the characters, their monologues and dialogues that induce action, organize the action itself, through the confrontation of the characters' characters.

I would also like to mention the book by V. Khalizev "Drama as a Phenomenon of Art", which deals with the issues of plot construction.

In the works of E. Bentley, T.S. Zepalova, N.O. Korst, A. Karyagin, M. Polyakova and others also touched upon issues related to the study of the artistic integrity and poetics of drama.

Modern researchers-methodists M.G. Kachurin, O.Yu. Bogdanova and others) talk about the difficulties that arise in the study of dramatic works that require a special psychological and pedagogical approach to the learning process.

“The study of dramatic poetry is, so to speak, the crown of the theory of literature ... This kind of poetry not only contributes to the serious mental development of young people, but with its lively interest and special effect on the soul, it settles the noblest love for the theater, in its great educational significance for society” - In .P. Ostrogorsky.

The specific features of drama are determined by:

• - Aesthetic properties of drama (an important feature of drama).
• - The size of the dramatic text (a small amount of drama imposes certain restrictions on the type of construction of the plot, character, space).
• - Lack of author's narration

The position of the author in a dramatic work is hidden more than in works of other kinds, and its identification requires special attention and reflection from the reader. Based on monologues, dialogues, remarks and remarks, the reader must imagine the time of action, the stop in which the characters live, imagine their appearance, manner of speaking and listening, catching gestures, feeling what is hidden behind the words and actions of each of them.

• - The presence of actors (sometimes called a poster). The author anticipates the appearance of the characters, giving a brief description of each of them (this is a remark). In the poster, another type of remark is possible - the author's indication of the place and time of the events.
• - Dividing the text into acts (or actions) and phenomena

Each action (act) of a drama, and often a picture, a scene, a phenomenon, is a relatively finished part of a harmonious whole, subordinated to a certain plan of the playwright. Inside the action there can be paintings or scenes. Each arrival or departure of the actor gives rise to a new action.

The author's remark precedes each act of the play, marks the appearance of the character on the stage and his departure. The remark accompanies the speech of the characters. When reading a play, they are addressed to the reader, when staged on stage - to the director and actor. The author's remark gives a certain support to the "recreating imagination" of the reader (Karyagin), suggests the situation, the atmosphere of the action, the nature of the characters' communication.

Remark says:

• - how to pronounce the replica of the hero (“with restraint”, “with tears”, “with delight”, “quietly”, “out loud”, etc.);
• - what gestures accompany him (“respectfully bowing”, “politely smiling”);
• - what actions of the hero influence the course of the event (“Bobchinsky looks out the door and hides in fright”).

The remark informs the characters, indicates their age, describes their appearance, what kind of relationship they are connected with, indicates the place of action (“a room in the mayor’s house”, the city), “actions” and gestures of the characters (for example: “looks out the window and screams” ; "brave").

Dialogic form of text construction

Dialogue in drama is a multi-valued concept. In the broad sense of the word, dialogue is a form of oral speech, a conversation between two or more persons. In this case, a monologue can also be part of the dialogue (the speech of the character addressed to himself or to other characters, but the speech is isolated, not dependent on the replicas of the interlocutors). This may be a form of oral speech, close to the author's description in epic works.

In connection with this issue, the theater critic V.S. Vladimirov writes: “Dramatic works allow portrait and landscape characteristics, designations of the external world, reproduction of inner speech only to the extent that all this “fits” in the word uttered by the hero in the course of action. The dialogue in the drama is distinguished by its special emotionality, richness of intonations (in turn, the absence of these qualities in the character's speech is an essential means of characterizing him). The dialogue clearly shows the "subtext" of the character's speech (request, demand, persuasion, etc.). Especially important for the characterization of the character are monologues in which the characters express their intentions. Dialogue in drama performs two functions: it gives a characterization of the characters and serves as a means of developing dramatic action. Understanding the second function of the dialogue is connected with the peculiarity of the development of the conflict in the drama.

A feature of the construction of a dramatic conflict

The dramatic conflict determines all the plot elements of a dramatic action, it "shines through the logic of the development of the 'individual', the relationship of the characters living and acting in his dramatic field."

The conflict is the "dialectics of drama" (E. Gorbunova), the unity and struggle of opposites. It is very crude, primitive and limited to understand the conflict as a juxtaposition of two characters with different life positions. The conflict expresses the shift of times, the clash of historical epochs and manifests itself at every point of the dramatic text. The hero, before making a certain decision or making an appropriate choice, goes through an internal struggle of hesitations, doubts, experiences of his inner self. The conflict dissolves in the action itself and is expressed through the transformation of characters that occurs throughout the play and is found in the context of the entire system of relationships between the characters . V. G. Belinsky states in this regard: “The conflict is the spring that drives the action, which should be directed towards one goal, towards one intention of the author.”

Dramatic ups and downs

The deepening of the dramatic conflict is facilitated by ups and downs (an important feature of the dramatic text), which has a certain function in the play. Peripetia - an unexpected circumstance that causes complications, an unexpected change in any business of the hero's life. Its function is connected with the general artistic conception of the play, with its conflict, problems and poetics. In a variety of cases, the vicissitudes appear as such a special moment in the development of dramatic relations, when they are, one way or another, stimulated by some new force that invades the conflict from outside.

The dual construction of the plot, working to reveal the subtext

The famous director and founder of the Moscow Art Theater K.S. Stanislavsky divided the play into "plan of external structure" and "plan of internal structure". For a great director, these two plans correspond to the categories “plot” and “canvas”. According to the director, the plot of a drama is an event chain in spatio-temporal sequence, and the canvas is a super-plot, super-characteristic, super-verbal phenomenon. If in theatrical practice this corresponds to the concept of text and subtext, then in a dramatic work - text and "undercurrent".

“The dual structure of the text “plot-canvas” determines the logic of the action of events, the behavior of the characters, their gestures, the logic of the functioning of symbolic sounds, the mixing of feelings that accompany the characters in everyday situations, pauses and replicas of the characters.” The characters of a dramatic work are included in the space-time environment, so the movement of the plot, the disclosure of the inner meaning (canvas) of the play is inextricably linked with the images of the characters.

Each word in the drama (context) is two-layered: the direct meaning is associated with the external - life and action, the figurative - with thought and state. The role of context in drama is more complex than in other literary genres. Since it is the context that creates a system of means for revealing subtext and outline. This is the only way to penetrate through externally depicted events into the true content of the drama. The complexity of the analysis of a dramatic work lies in the disclosure of this paradoxical connection between the canvas and the plot, the subtext and the “undercurrent”.

For example, in the drama "Dowry" by A.N. Ostrovsky, the subtext is felt in the conversation between the merchants Knurov and Vozhevatov about the sale and purchase of a steamboat, which imperceptibly passes to the second possible "purchase" (this scene must be read in class). The conversation is about an “expensive diamond” (Larisa) and a “good jeweler”. The subtext of the dialogue is obvious: Larisa is a thing, an expensive diamond, which only a rich merchant (Vozhevatov or Knurov) should own.

Subtext arises in colloquial speech as a means of keeping silent "back thoughts": the characters feel and think not what they say. It is often created by means of “dispersed repetition” (T. Silman), all links of which act with each other in complex relationships, from which their deep meaning is born.

The law of "tightness of the series of events"

The dynamism of the action, the cohesion of the replicas of the characters, pauses, the author's remarks - make up the law of "crowdedness of the series of events." The tightness of the plot line affects the rhythm of the drama and determines the artistic concept of the work. The events in the drama take place as if before the eyes of the reader (the viewer directly sees them), who becomes, as it were, an accomplice of what is happening. The reader creates his own imaginary action, which can sometimes coincide with the moment of reading the play.

Today, even the most unlimited possibilities of a computer cannot replace human-to-human communication, because as long as humanity exists, it will be interested in art that helps to understand and solve moral and aesthetic problems that arise in life and are reflected in works of art.

A.V. Chekhov wrote about the fact that drama occupies a special place not only in literature, but also in the theater: “Drama has attracted, is attracting and will continue to attract the attention of many theater and literary critics.” In the recognition of the writer, the dual purpose of dramaturgy is also palpable: it is addressed to both the reader and the viewer. Hence the impossibility of complete isolation in the study of a dramatic work from the study of the conditions of its theatrical realization, "the constant dependence of its forms on the forms of stage production" (Tomashevsky).

The well-known critic V. G. Belinsky reasonably sought a way to a synthetic understanding of a theatrical work as a result of an organic change in the functions and structure of individual types of art. It becomes clear for him the need to take into account the functional significance of the various structural elements of the play (as a dramatic work) and the performance. A theatrical work - for Belinsky - is not a result, but a process, and therefore each performance is "an individual and almost unique process that creates a number of concretizations of a dramatic work that have both unity and difference."

Everyone knows the words of Gogol: “The play lives only on the stage ... Take a long look at the full length and breadth of the burning population of our divided homeland, how many good people we have, but how many tares there are, from which there is no life for the good and for which we are powerless follow no law. On their stage: let all the people see them.

A.N. Ostrovsky.

K.S. Stanislavsky repeatedly emphasized: “Only on the stage of the theater can one recognize dramatic works in their entirety and essence,” and further “if it were otherwise, the viewer would not aspire to the theater, but would sit at home and read the play.”

The question of the dual orientation of drama and theater also worried the art historian A.A. Karyagin. In his book Drama as an Aesthetic Problem, he wrote: “For the playwright, drama is more like a spectacle, created by the power of creative imagination and fixed in a play that can be read if desired, than a literary work, which, moreover, can be played on stage. And it's not the same at all."

The question of the relationship between the two functions of drama (reading and performance) is also at the center of two studies: “Reading and seeing play. A Study of Simultaneity in Drama” by the Dutch theater critic W. Hogendoorn and “In the World of Ideas and Images” by the literary critic M. Polyakov.

V. Hogendoorn in his book seeks to give an accurate terminological description of each of the concepts he uses. Considering the concept of "drama", V. Hogendoorn notes that this term, with all the variety of its meanings, has three main ones: 1) drama as a real linguistic work created in accordance with the laws of this genre; 2) drama as a basis for creating a work of theatrical art, a kind of literary fabrication; 3) drama as a product of staging, a work recreated from a dramatic text by a certain team (director, actor, etc.) by reframing the information contained in the text and the emotional and artistic charge through the individual consciousness of each participant in its production.

W. Hogendoorn's research is based on the assertion that the process of the theatrical representation of a drama differs from its development by the reader, since the perception of a theatrical production of a drama is perception both auditory and visual at the same time.

The concept of the Dutch theater critic contains an important methodological idea: the drama must be studied by the methods of theatrical pedagogy. Visual and auditory perception of the text (when watching a performance and when playing improvisational scenes) contribute to the activation of individual creative activity of students and the development of creative reading techniques for a dramatic work.

M. Polyakov in the book “In the World of Ideas and Images” writes: “The starting point for describing such a complex phenomenon as a theatrical spectacle remains a dramatic text…. The verbal (verbal) structure of the drama imposes a certain type of stage behavior, a type of action, structural connections of gestural and linguistic signs. The specificity of the reader's perception of a dramatic work "is due to the intermediate nature of its status: the reader is both an actor and a spectator, he, as it were, stages the play for himself. And this determines the duality of his understanding of the play,” the literary critic believes. The process of perception of a dramatic work by the spectator, actor and reader is homogeneous, according to the author, only in the sense that each of them, as it were, passes the drama through his individual consciousness, his own world of ideas and feelings.

Features of the conflict. Chekhov developed a special concept of depicting life and man - fundamentally everyday, “unheroic”: “Let everything on the stage be as complicated and at the same time just as simple as in life. People dine, only dine, and at this time their happiness is built up and their lives are broken. The traditional pre-Chekhov drama is characterized, first of all, by an event that disrupts the traditional course of life: a clash of passions, polar forces, and in these clashes the characters' characters are more fully revealed (for example, in A. N. Ostrovsky's The Thunderstorm). In Chekhov's plays, there are no sharp conflicts, clashes, struggles. It seems that nothing happens to them. The episodes are filled with ordinary, even unrelated conversations, trifles of everyday life, insignificant details. As stated in the play "Uncle Vanya", the world will not die from "loud" events, "not from robbers, not from fires, but from hatred, enmity, from all these petty squabbles ...". Chekhov's works do not move from event to event (we do not have the opportunity to follow the development of the plot - in the absence of such), but rather from mood to mood. The plays are built not on opposition, but on unity, the commonality of all the characters - unity in the face of the general disorder of life. A.P. Skaftymov wrote about the peculiarities of the conflict in Chekhov's plays: “There are no guilty ones, therefore, there are no direct opponents either. There are no direct opponents, there is not and cannot be a struggle. The addition of circumstances that are, as it were, outside the sphere of influence of these people is to blame. The sad situation develops out of their will, and suffering comes by itself.

The conflict in a dramatic work drives the plot, gives rise to various collisions, and helps to identify the characters of the characters. A conflict is a clash of different interests, different moral attitudes, different characters and temperaments. However, it can also be internal, conflict can be found even in lyrical works, where opposite images and concepts are combined, and in montage joints-oppositions.

The weakening of the plot intrigue and the muting of the conflict due to the careful delineation of scenes, situations and characters that are outside the main plot, acquiring a completely independent meaning. The everyday flow of life in its small and random manifestations becomes a distinctive feature and the main object of the image in Chekhov's dramaturgy. The "non-eventfulness" of Chekhov's plays is directly related to their "multi-hero character" (the absence of a central character, a bearer of a certain idea or an important value orientation).

the originality of the new type of drama created by Chekhov was clearly manifested. Everyday everyday life becomes Chekhov's main and only source of dramatic conflict, the traditional for pre-Chekhovian dramaturgy the struggle of characters, the "clash of characters" (V. G. Belinsky's formula), plot twists and turns as the main form of development of the action lose their former, organizing role in Chekhov's plays. The point here is not in this or that event, not in the contradictions of human interests and passions. In the world of Chekhov's drama, everyone or almost everyone suffers, and no one in particular is to blame for this. "... It is not individual people who are to blame, but the whole existing composition of life as a whole."

The dialogues in Chekhov's plays acquired a "monologic form".

To create the impression of greater everyday credibility, Chekhov also uses sound and noise effects: the sounds of the tocsin, the sound of a bell, playing the violin, the knock of an ax on the trees. Accompanying or interspersing with them the conversations and remarks of the characters, he achieves the merging of the verbal, “significant”, and non-verbal, “insignificant”, sound series into one common sound whole, in which the traditional rigid boundary between “significant” and “insignificant” begins to shift and blur. .

Strengthening the role of the psychological "subtext", the sphere of the hero's hidden emotional experiences, which are not reflected in his conscious speech, but expressed in random remarks or slips of the tongue.

Conflict - from lat. conflictus("collision"). By definition, P. Pavidramatic conflict comes from the clash of "the antagonistic forces of drama." Wolkenstein writes about this in his Dramaturgy: “not only subjectively, from the point of view of the central actor, wherever we see intricately intersecting relationships, we observe a tendency to reveal the struggling forces into two camps.” Collide, antagonistic in nature, forces that we define as initial and leading proposed circumstances (see "Ideological - thematic analysis"). The term "proposed circumstances" seems to us the most appropriate, since it includes not only the main characters, but also the initial situation, the circumstances that influenced the origin and development of the conflict conflict.

The main forces in the play are personified in specific characters, so often the conversation about the conflict is conducted mainly from the point of view of analyzing the behavior of one or another character. Among the various theories about the emergence and development of dramatic conflict, Hegel’s definition seems to us the most accurate: “the dramatic process proper is a constant forward movement to ultimate disaster. This is explained by the fact that collision constitutes the central moment of the whole. Therefore, on the one hand, everyone strives to identify this conflict, and on the other hand, it is precisely the discord and contradiction of opposing mindsets, goals and activities that needs to be resolved and striving for such a result.

Speaking of the dramatic conflict, it should be noted in particular artistic nature. It must always be remembered that the conflict in the play cannot be identical to some kind of life conflict. In this regard, we briefly note the different approaches to understanding the conflict.

Conflict in psychology

Conflict, from a psychological point of view, is defined as clash of oppositely directed goals, interests, positions or subjects of interaction. This clash is based on a conflict situation that arises due to conflicting positions on one issue, or opposing methods and means to achieve the goal, or in a mismatch of interests. A conflict situation contains the subjects of a possible conflict and its object. In order for the conflict to begin to develop, an incident is necessary in which one side begins to infringe on the interests of the other. In psychology, types of conflict development have been developed, this typology is based on the definition of differences in goals, actions, and the end result. Based on these criteria, they can be: potential, actual, direct, indirect, constructive, stabilizing, non-constructive, destructive.

A subject can be either a single person or several persons. Depending on the conflict situation, psychologists distinguish interpersonal, intergroup, interorganizational, class, interethnic e conflicts. A special group is intrapersonal conflicts (see the theories of Freud, Jung, etc.). It is mainly understood as the production of the subject's ambivalent aspirations, by awakening two or more strong motives that cannot be resolved together. Such conflicts are often unconscious, meaning that the person cannot positively identify the source of their problems.

The most common type of conflict is interpersonal. During it, opponents try to psychologically suppress each other, discredit and humiliate their opponent in public opinion. If it is impossible to resolve this conflict, then interpersonal relationships are destroyed. Conflicts that involve intense threat or fear are not easily resolved and often render the person simply helpless. Subsequent attitudes, as he permits, may be directed towards alleviating anxiety rather than solving real problems.

In Aesthetics, conflict is largely understood as direct or indirect reflection of life's contradictions by art(but this, as we have already noted, is not always the case). The artistic conflict has in its content the scope of the subject and is present in all types of art. It is of different quality in its essence and can reflect both the most serious social conflicts, universal antinomies, and simply funny misunderstandings (farces, vaudevilles). Conflict, from an ideological point of view, is a temporary violation of the norm of life, taking place against a conflict-free background, or, on the contrary, it marks the disharmony of the current life.

The artistic conflict is embodied and consistently revealed in the direct or indirect confrontation of the characters. It can also be revealed in the stable background of the events depicted, in thoughts and feelings independent of the specific situation, in the atmosphere (Chekhov, Shaw, Brecht and the so-called "non-Aristotelian" dramaturgy).

Conflict in ethics.

The specific situation of moral choice in which a certain decision is made, and at the same time a person states a contradiction in his mind: the choice and implementation (in the form of an act) of one norm leads to the destruction of another norm. At the same time, the norm being destroyed has a certain moral value. Naturally, this choice is expressed in a conflict situation. The conflict in ethics has two types: between the norms of different moral systems and within the same system. In the latter case, different levels of development of the given system collide. The resolution of the conflict is based on the awareness of the hierarchy of moral values ​​and bears personal responsibility for the choice.

The nature of the conflict

The nature of the conflict, its underlying causes lie in the worldview of the character, while it is necessary to take into account social causes, in general, the whole cumulative complex, which we conditionally call the “inner world of the hero”. Any conflict in a play has its roots in depth, in different worldviews, which, at a given moment (the time of the play) or historical (the era in which everything takes place), are in a state of conflict. On this occasion, Pavipe notes that “in the end, the conflict is determined not only by the will of the playwright, but depends on the objective conditions of the described ... reality.”

For a long time it was believed that the nature of the conflict is based on social inequality and class struggle (the so-called method of "socialist realism"). Nevertheless, the nature of the conflict in many plays is based on certain spiritual searches of the hero, his worldview, the foundations of faith or the tragedy of unbelief, etc. This deep (spiritual) movement of the spirit towards self-realization is manifested at the level of action in the form of certain actions. They face a different (alien) will and, accordingly, behavior, while not only outwardly materialized interests are affected, but the very foundations of a person’s inner being.

Not because of resentment or insult Tybalt kills Mercutio - this is a superficial expression of the conflict - the very existence of this type of universe is unacceptable to him. This scene is the quintessential tragedy. The most tragic thing in this play is the further actions of Romeo. He suddenly steps over a certain prohibition lying in his soul. Having killed Tybalt, Romeo accepts the fact of the murder as a means to resolve the contradiction, there is no other way out for him. This is how the tragic ending is prepared. In "Hamlet" it is undoubtedly not the struggle for power and the throne that unfolds, and not only revenge drives Hamlet: the most important questions from the category of "to be / not to be" are decided by all the heroes of the play. But perhaps the most difficult thing in this regard is that if "to be" - how. Nevertheless, we do not deny the influence of the principles of materialistic dialectics on the nature of dramatic conflict, this is as stupid as denying the existence of matter itself, but one cannot completely subordinate one to the other.

As we have already noted, the conflict is not some abstract category, it is "humanized" in the "play" and unfolds in action. It is even possible to define the very concept of action as conflict in development. Action is characterized by dynamism, growth, development, etc. “Dramatic action,” wrote Hegel, “is not limited to the simple and calm achievement of a certain goal; on the contrary, it takes place in an atmosphere of conflicts and clashes and is subjected to the pressure of circumstances, the pressure of passions and characters that oppose and resist it. These conflicts and collisions, in turn, give rise to actions and reactions that, at a certain moment, necessitate reconciliation.

For the Western theater, this understanding of conflict is a distinctive feature, however, like the category of conflict itself, its main characteristic. But for many theaters - in particular the eastern ones - such an understanding is not typical, which accordingly changes the very nature of the theater.

As you know, initially the conflict exists before events presented in the play (in the "suggested circumstances"), or rather, the events of the play are the resolution of an already existing conflict. Then a certain event occurs that violates the existing balance and the conflict unfolds, acquiring a visible (visible) form. It is worth noting that it is from this moment that the play begins directly. All further action is reduced to the establishment of a new balance, as a result of the victory of one conflicting side over the other.

As we have noted more than once, the character is the spokesman for any conflict in the play, the hero (a group of characters) can be considered the spokesman for the main conflict, so the analysis comes down to an analysis of actions, words (verbal action) and various psychological states experienced by the hero. In addition, the conflict finds its expression in the warehouse of the main events: in the plot and plot, the place of action, time (for example, the "dark kingdom" - the city of Malinov in Ostrovsky's "Thunderstorm"). The director has a number of additional means of expressing the conflict at his disposal: music, light, scenography, mise-en-scene, etc. The conflict is resolved, traditionally, at the end of the play. We can say that this provision is the main requirement for dramaturgy. But there are a number of plays (for example, in the theater of paradox) in which we can observe the unresolved nature of the main conflict. This is the main idea of ​​such plays. This principle is characteristic of open-form dramaturgy.

According to Aristotle, the resolution of the main conflict sets as its goal not so much external, artistic goals associated with the drama, but primarily related to the impact on the viewer and their experience at the end of the play. catharsis and, as a consequence, healing. In this, Aristotle sees the main meaning of the theatrical performance, and hence the conflict, as an integral part of this performance.

It should be noted that the resolution of the main conflict in the dramaturgy of the "closed form" occurs at various levels:

· on the subjective or at the level of ideas, when the character himself voluntarily abandons his intentions in favor of a higher moral authority;

· on the objective when a certain power, as a rule, political (the Duke in Romeo and Juliet), but maybe also religious (Ostrovsky's The Snow Maiden) abruptly suppresses the conflict;

· on the artificial when the playwright resorts to a technique called "deus ex machine".

The theme of the nature of dramatic conflict is so complex and extensive that it is practically impossible to give an exhaustive definition of this category in a short essay. This topic requires a special, special study, so we will limit ourselves to what has been said and consider in more detail the typology and evolution of the dramatic conflict in historical and artistic development. For some reason, this very question has remained practically unexplored in the theory of drama, and we offer our own concept. It is not exhaustive, but can be a starting point for this type of research.

Types of conflicts

In our opinion, there are several types (levels) of conflicts. In a purely theatrical aspect, the conflict takes place on stage either among the characters (closed-form dramaturgy) or between the character and the audience (open-form dramaturgy).

According to the semantic principles, several levels of conflict flow can be distinguished. It can take place both on one plane and on several:

· ideological(conflict of ideas, worldviews, etc.);

· social;

· moral;

· religious;

· political;

· household;

· family.

There are several more levels. For example, the struggle between subjective and objective; metaphysical struggle of man (overcoming oneself). In addition, there are several species conflicts divided into internal and external by where they flow: in the soul of a character or between characters.

Internal view of the conflict.

Conflict within a person (with himself). For example, between reason and feeling; duty and conscience; desire and morality; conscious and subconscious; personality and individuality; essence and existence, etc.

external types of conflict.

These types of conflicts are present to varying degrees in any dramatic work, but depending on the era, the current in art, one particular type of conflict comes to the fore as a dominant. Putting together in a specific and original combination, it forms a new type of conflict. A change of currents in art is a constant change of types of conflicts. We can say that as the type of conflict changes, the epoch in art also changes, each innovator in the art of drama brings a new type of conflict. This can be traced back to the history of the evolution of dramaturgy.

CONFLICT. ACTION. HERO IN A DRAMA WORK

The conflict of the play, as a rule, is not identical to some kind of life clash in its everyday form. He generalizes, typifies the contradiction that the artist, in this case the playwright, observes in life. The depiction of this or that conflict in a dramatic work is a way of revealing social contradictions in an effective struggle.

Remaining typical, the conflict is at the same time personified in a dramatic work in specific heroes, “humanized”.

The social conflicts depicted in dramatic works, of course, are not subject to any unification in content - their number and variety are endless. However, the ways of compositional alignment of the dramaturgical conflict are typical. Reviewing the existing dramatic experience, we can talk about the typology of the structure of the dramatic conflict, about the three main types of its construction.

Hero - Hero. Conflicts are built according to this type - Lyubov Yarovaya and her husband, Othello and Iago. In this case, the author and the viewer sympathize with one of the parties to the conflict, one of the characters (or one group of characters) and together with him experience the circumstances of the struggle with the opposite side.

The author of a dramatic work and the viewer are always on the same side, since the task of the author is to agree with the viewer, to convince the viewer of what he wants to convince him. Needless to say, the author does not always reveal to the viewer his likes and dislikes towards his characters. Moreover, a frontal statement of one's positions has little in common with artistic work, especially with dramaturgy. No need to rush about with ideas on stage. It is necessary that the audience leave the theater with them - Mayakovsky rightly said.

Another type of conflict construction: Hero - Auditorium. Satirical works are usually built on such a conflict. The audience denies with laughter the behavior and morality of the satirical characters acting on the stage. The positive hero in this performance - its author N.V. Gogol said about the "Inspector General" - is in the hall.

The third type of construction of the main conflict: the Hero (or heroes) and the Environment they oppose. In this case, the author and the viewer are, as it were, in a third position, observing both the hero and the environment, following the ups and downs of this struggle, not necessarily joining one side or the other. A classic example of such a construction is Leo Tolstoy's "Living Corpse". The hero of the drama, Fyodor Protasov, is in conflict with the milieu, whose sanctimonious morality compels him first to "leave" her in revelry and drunkenness, then to portray a fictitious death, and then actually commit suicide.

The viewer will by no means consider Fedor Protasov a positive hero worthy of imitation. But he will sympathize with him and, accordingly, condemn the opposing Protasov environment - the so-called "flower of society" - which forced him to die.

Vivid examples of constructing a conflict of the Hero-Wednesday type are Shakespeare's Hamlet, A. S. Griboyedov's "Woe from Wit", and A. N. Ostrovsky's "Thunderstorm".

The division of dramatic conflicts according to the type of their construction is not absolute. In many works, one can observe a combination of two types of conflict construction. So, for example, if in a satirical play, along with negative characters, there are also positive characters, in addition to the main conflict Hero - Audience, we will observe another one - the conflict Hero - Hero, the conflict between positive and negative characters on the stage.

In addition, the Hero-Wednesday conflict ultimately contains the Hero-Hero conflict. After all, the environment in a dramatic work is not faceless. It also consists of heroes, sometimes very bright, whose names have become common nouns. Recall Famusov and Molchalin in Woe from Wit, or Kabanikha in Thunderstorm. In the general concept of "Environment" we unite them according to the principle of commonality of their views, a single attitude towards the hero opposing them.

The action in a dramatic work is nothing but a developmental conflict. It develops from the initial conflict situation that arose in the beginning. It develops not just sequentially - one event after another - but by the birth of a subsequent event from the previous one, thanks to the previous one, according to the laws of cause and effect. The action of the play at any given moment must be fraught with the development of further action.

The theory of drama at one time considered it necessary to observe three unities in a dramatic work: the unity of time, the unity of place and the unity of action. Practice, however, has shown that dramaturgy can easily do without observing the unity of place and time, but the unity of action is a truly necessary condition for the existence of a dramatic work as a work of art.

The observance of the unity of action is essentially the observance of a single picture of the development of the main conflict. Thus, it is a condition for creating a holistic image of the conflict event, which is depicted in this work. The unity of action - a picture of the development of the main conflict that is continuous and not replaced in the course of the play - is a criterion for the artistic integrity of the work. Violation of the unity of action - the substitution of the conflict tied up in the plot - undermines the possibility of creating a holistic artistic image of the conflict event, inevitably seriously reduces the artistic level of a dramatic work.

The action in a dramatic work should be considered only what happens directly on the stage or on the screen. The so-called "pre-stage", "non-stage", "on-stage" actions are all information that can contribute to the understanding of the action, but in no case can replace it. The abuse of the amount of such information to the detriment of the action greatly reduces the emotional impact of the play (performance) on the viewer, and sometimes reduces it to nothing.

In the literature, one can sometimes find an insufficiently clear explanation of the relationship between the concepts of "conflict" and "action". E. G. Kholodov writes about this as follows: “The specific subject of the image in the drama is, as you know, life in motion, or in other words, action.” This is inaccurate. Life in motion is any flow of life. It can, of course, be called action. Although, in relation to real life, it would be more accurate to speak not about action, but about actions. Life is infinitely multi-functional.

The subject of the depiction in the drama is not life in general, but one or another specific social conflict, personified in the heroes of this play. Action, therefore, is not the effervescence of life in general, but the given conflict in its concrete development.

Further, E. G. Kholodov clarifies his wording to some extent, but the definition of the action remains inaccurate: “The drama reproduces the action in the form of a dramatic struggle,” he writes, “that is, in the form of a conflict.” One cannot agree with this. Drama does not reproduce action in the form of conflict, but, on the contrary, conflict in the form of action. And this is by no means a play on words, but a restoration of the true essence of the concepts under consideration. Conflict is the source of action. Action is the form of his movement, his existence in the work.

The source of drama is life itself. From the real contradictions of the development of society, the playwright takes a conflict to depict in his work. He subjectifies it in specific characters, he organizes it in space and time, gives, in other words, his own picture of the development of the conflict, creates a dramatic action. Drama is an imitation of life - what Aristotle spoke of - only in the most general sense of these words. In each given work of dramaturgy, the action is not written off from any particular situation, but created, organized, molded by the author. The movement, therefore, proceeds thus: the contradiction of the development of society; a typical, objectively existing conflict on the basis of a given contradiction; its author's concretization - personification in the heroes of the work, in their collisions, in their contradiction and opposition to each other; the development of the conflict (from the beginning to the denouement, to the finale), that is, the alignment of the action.

In another place, E. G. Kholodov, relying on the thought of Hegel, comes to a correct understanding of the relationship between the concepts of "conflict" and "action".

Hegel writes: "Action presupposes circumstances that precede it, leading to collisions, to action and reaction."

The plot of the action, according to Hegel, lies where the author appears in the work, “given” by the author, “only those circumstances that, picked up by the individual mindset of the soul and its needs, give rise to just that specific conflict, the deployment and resolution of which constitutes a special action of this work of art."

So, action is the beginning, "deployment" and "resolution" of the conflict.

The hero in a dramatic work must fight, be a participant in a social clash. This, of course, does not mean that the heroes of other literary works of poetry or prose do not participate in the social struggle. But there may be other characters as well. In a work of dramaturgy, there should be no heroes standing outside the depicted social conflict.

The author depicting social conflict is always on one side of it. His sympathies and, accordingly, the sympathies of the audience are given to one heroes, and antipathies to others. At the same time, the concepts of “positive” and “negative” heroes are relative concepts and not very accurate. In each case, we can talk about positive and negative characters from the point of view of the author of this work.

In our common understanding of modern life, a positive hero is one who fights for the establishment of social justice, for progress, for the ideals of socialism. The hero is negative, respectively, the one who contradicts him in ideology, in politics, in behavior, in relation to work.

The hero of a dramatic work is always a son of his time, and from this point of view, the choice of a hero for a dramatic work is also of a historical nature, determined by historical and social circumstances. At the dawn of Soviet drama, it was easy for authors to find a positive and negative hero. Everyone who held on to yesterday was a negative hero - representatives of the tsarist apparatus, nobles, landlords, merchants, White Guard generals, officers, sometimes even soldiers, but in any case, everyone who fought against the young Soviet power. Accordingly, it was easy to find a positive hero in the ranks of revolutionaries, party leaders, heroes of the civil war, etc. Today, in a period of comparative peacetime, the task of finding a hero is much more difficult, because social clashes are not expressed as clearly as they were expressed in years of revolution and civil war, or later, during the Great Patriotic War.

"Reds!", "Whites!", "Ours!", "Nazis!" - in different years, children shouted in different ways, looking at the screens of cinema halls. The reaction of adults was not so immediate, but fundamentally similar. The division of heroes into “ours” and “not ours” in works dedicated to the revolution, civil, Patriotic war was not difficult, either for the authors or for the audience. Unfortunately, the artificial division of Soviet people into “ours” and “not ours” imposed from above by Stalin and his propaganda apparatus also provided material for work only in black and white paint, images from these positions of “positive” and “negative” heroes.

A sharp social struggle, as we see, is taking place even now, and in the sphere of ideology, and in the sphere of production, and in the sphere of morality, in matters of law, norms of behavior. The drama of life, of course, never disappears. The struggle between movement and inertia, between indifference and burning, between broadmindedness and narrow-mindedness, between nobility and baseness, search and complacency, between good and evil in the broadest sense of these words, always exists and makes it possible to search for heroes as positive, with whom we sympathize. , as well as negative ones.

It has already been said above that the relativity of the concept of a “positive” hero also lies in the fact that in dramaturgy, as in literature in general, in some cases the hero with whom we sympathize is not an example to follow, a model of behavior and life position. It is difficult to attribute Katerina from The Thunderstorm and Larisa from A. N. Ostrovsky’s The Dowry to positive characters from these points of view. We sincerely sympathize with them as victims of a society that lives according to the laws of bestial morality, but we, of course, reject their way of dealing with their lack of rights, humiliation. The main thing is that in life there are no absolutely positive or absolutely negative people at all. If people shared in this way in life, and a “positive” person would not have reasons and opportunities to turn out to be “negative” and vice versa, art would lose its meaning. It would lose one of its most important purposes - to contribute to the improvement of the human personality.

Only a lack of understanding of the essence of the impact of a dramatic work on the audience can explain the existence of primitive assessments of the ideological sound of a particular play by calculating the balance between the number of "positive" and "negative" characters. Especially often with such calculations they approach the assessment of satirical plays.

The requirement for a numerical "preponderance" of "positive" characters over "negative" ones is, in its inconsistency, akin to another - the requirement for an obligatory positive ending (the so-called happy end) of the work.

Such an approach is based on a misunderstanding that a work of art has the power of influence only as a whole, that the positive result of its influence does not always result from the preponderance of positive characters over negative ones and from their physical victory over them.

No one, presumably, would demand that for a correct understanding of I. E. Repin’s painting “Ivan the Terrible Kills His Son”, the artist depicted “positive” courtiers standing around the tsar and prince, shaking their heads condemningly. No one will doubt the revolutionary pathos of B. V. Ioganson's painting "The Interrogation of Communists" on the grounds that only two communists are depicted on it, and there are several White Guard counterintelligence officers. For works of drama, however, such an approach is considered possible, despite the fact that its history provides no less examples of its inadmissibility than painting, than any other art. The movie "Chapaev" helped to educate millions of heroes, although Chapaev dies at the end of the film. The famous tragedy Vishnevsky is optimistic not only in name, although his heroine - the commissar - dies.

The moral victory or political rightness of heroes can increase or decrease by no means depending on their numbers.

The hero of a dramatic work, in contrast to the hero of prose, who is usually described in detail and comprehensively by the author, characterizes himself, in the words of A. M. Gorky, "on his own", by his actions, without the help of the author's description. This does not mean that brief descriptions of the heroes cannot be given in remarks. But we must not forget that stage directions are written for the director and performer. The audience in the theater will not hear them.

Thus, for example, the American playwright Tennessee Williams gives a devastating description of its protagonist, Stanley Kowalski, in a remark at the beginning of the play A Streetcar Named Desire. However, before the audience, Stanley appears quite respectable and even handsome. Only as a result of his actions does he reveal himself as an egoist, a knight of profit, a rapist, as an evil and cruel person. The author's remark is intended here only for the director and performer. The viewer does not need to know.

Modern playwrights sometimes "voice" their remarks with the help of a presenter who, on behalf of the author, gives the characters the necessary characteristics. As a rule, the presenter appears in historical documentary plays. To understand what is happening there, explanations are often needed that cannot be put into the mouths of the characters themselves due to the documentary nature of their text, on the one hand, and most importantly, in order to preserve a lively dialogue that is not burdened with commentary elements.

Conflict - (from lat. Collision) - confrontation, clash of actors in the implementation of their life tasks.

Conflict is always a struggle between something and something but never between someone and someone. Characters in a playwright are the bearers of conflict. The conflict generalizes, typifies the contradictions that the artist (in this case, the playwright) observes in life. The depiction of conflict in a play is a way of revealing social contradictions.

The number and variety of social conflicts is unlimited, but we can talk about three main types of its construction:

1. hero - hero - the author and the viewer sympathize with one of the parties to the conflict, one of the heroes (or a group of heroes) and together with him experience the circumstances of the struggle. Author and viewer are always on the same side. The task of the author is to agree with the viewer. But the author does not always show his sympathies to the viewer. “You don't have to run around with ideas on stage. It is necessary for the audience to leave the theater with them…” V. Mayakovsky. Note: "Othello" - Shakespeare.

2.hero - auditorium - Usually works of a satirical nature are built on such a conflict. The auditorium laughingly denies the behavior and morality of the satirical characters. Note: "Inspector" - Gogol.

3.hero - Wednesday - the author and the viewer are in the third position, i.e. they observe both the hero and the environment, follow the ups and downs of this struggle, not necessarily joining one group or another. Note: "Hamlet" - Shakespeare, "Thunderstorm" - Ostrovsky.

It is often possible to observe a combination of two types of conflict construction. So, for example, the hero-environment conflict contains the hero-hero conflict, since the environment in a dramatic work is not faceless. It also consists of heroes, sometimes very bright, whose names have become common nouns (Kabanikha by Ostrovsky).

There are three levels of conflict resolution:

*contradictions remain unresolved;

* reconciliation of contradictions (eg: in comedy);

* Removal of contradictions in the event of the death of heroes.

The action in a dramatic work is nothing more than a conflict in development. It develops from the initial conflict situation (which arose in the denouement).

Previously, it was considered necessary to observe three unities: the unity of place, time, action. But the truly necessary unity of action, this is a necessary condition for the existence of a dramatic work.

The unity of action is a picture of the development of the main conflict that is continuous in the course of the play.

An action in a dramatic work should be considered only what happens directly on the stage “before the stage”, “not stage”, “behind the stage” - all this information helps to understand the action, but it cannot replace it.

The action in the drama is not the seething of life in general, but a concrete conflict in its dynamic development.

The hero in a dramatic work must fight, be a participant in a social clash. A hero is always a son of his time. The choice of a hero for a dramatic work is of a historical nature, determined by historical and social circumstances. A positive and negative hero is a relative concept, that is, in drama the hero whom we sympathize with is not an example to follow, the father of behavior and life position (for example: Ostrovsky's "Thunderstorm" Larisa - we sympathize with the heroine, but we reject the way of struggle).

There are no absolutely positive or absolutely negative people in life. If people shared in this way in life, art would lose its meaning, as it loses one of its most important purposes - to contribute to the improvement of the human personality.

The hero of a dramatic work characterizes himself, according to Gorky's expression, "on his own," by his own attempts, without the help of the author's description.