In “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” L.N. Andreev explores the psychological state of the heroes sentenced to execution. Each character in the work experiences the approach of death in his own way. First L.N. Andreev talks about the torment of an obese minister fleeing an assassination attempt by terrorists, which he was informed about. At first, while there were people around him, he experienced a feeling of pleasant excitement. Left alone, the minister plunges into an atmosphere of animal fear. He recalls recent cases of assassination attempts on high-ranking officials and literally identifies his body with those scraps of human flesh that he once saw at crime scenes.
L.N. Andreev does not spare artistic details to depict naturalistic details: “... From these memories, my own corpulent, sick body, stretched out on the bed, seemed already alien, already experiencing the fiery force of an explosion.” Analyzing his own psychological state, the minister understands that he would calmly drink his coffee. The idea arises in the work. that it is not death itself that is terrible, but its knowledge, especially if the day and hour of your end are indicated. The minister understands that he will have no peace until he survives this hour for which the alleged assassination attempt is scheduled. The tension of the whole organism reaches such strength that it thinks that the aorta will not withstand it and that it may physically not be able to cope with the growing excitement.
Further in the story L.N. Andreev explores the fate of seven prisoners sentenced to death by hanging. Five of them are exactly the same terrorists who were caught in the unsuccessful assassination attempt. The writer gives detailed portraits of them, in which already during the trial scene signs of approaching death are visible: sweat appears on the prisoners’ foreheads, their fingers tremble, there is a desire to scream and break their fingers.
For prisoners, the special torture is also not so much the execution itself, during which they behave courageously and with dignity, supporting each other, but the long wait.
L.N. Andreev consistently presents the reader with a whole gallery of images of terrorists. These are Tanya Kovapchuk, Musya, Werner, Sergei Golovin and Vasily Kashirin. The most difficult test before death for the heroes is a meeting with their parents. “The execution itself, in all its monstrous unusualness, in its brain-shattering madness, seemed easier to the imagination and did not seem as terrible as these few minutes, short and incomprehensible, standing as if outside of time, as if outside life itself,” - this is how he conveys feelings Sergei Golovin before the execution of L.N. Andreev. The writer conveys the hero’s excited state before the date through a gesture: Sergei paces furiously around the cell, pinching his beard, wincing. However, the parents try to behave courageously and support Sergei. The father is in a state of tortured, desperate firmness. Even the mother only kissed and sat down silently, did not cry, but smiled strangely. Only at the end of the date, when the parents kiss Sergei jealously, do tears appear in their eyes. However, at the last minute, the father again supports his son and blesses him to die. In this artistically expressive scene, the writer glorifies the power of parental love, the most selfless and selfless feeling in the world.
Only his mother comes to see Vasily Kashirin on a date. As if in passing, we learn that his father is a rich merchant. The parents do not understand their son’s actions and condemn him. However, the mother still came to say goodbye. During the date, she seems to not understand the current situation, asks why her son is cold, and reproaches him for the last minutes of the date.
It is symbolic that they cry in different corners of the room, even in the face of death, talking about something empty and unnecessary. Only after the mother leaves the prison building does she clearly understand that her son will be hanged tomorrow. L.N. Andreev emphasizes that the mother’s torment is perhaps a hundred times stronger than the experiences of the person doomed to execution. The old woman falls, crawls on the icy crust, and she imagines that she is feasting at a wedding, and they keep pouring wine on her. In this scene, where grief borders on a crazy vision, the full force of despair of the heroine is conveyed, who will never attend her son’s wedding, will not see him happy.
Tanya Kovalchuk worries primarily about her comrades. Musya is happy to die as a heroine and martyr: “There is no doubt, no hesitation, she is accepted into the fold, she is rightfully
2-10738 joins the ranks of those bright ones who, from time immemorial, through the fire, torture and execution, go to the high sky.” Basking in her romantic dreams, she had already mentally stepped into immortality. Musya was ready for madness for the sake of the triumph of a moral victory, for the sake of euphoria from the madness of her “feat.” “I would even like this: to go out alone in front of a whole regiment of soldiers and start shooting at them from a Browning gun. Even if I am alone, and there are thousands of them, I will not kill anyone. This is what is important, that there are thousands of them. When thousands kill one, it means that one has won,” the girl reasons.
Sergei Golovin feels sorry for his young life. His fear was especially acute after physical exercise. While in freedom, he felt at these moments a special upsurge of cheerfulness. In the last hours, the hero feels that he has been exposed: “There is no death yet, but there is no longer life, but there is something new, amazingly incomprehensible, and either completely devoid of meaning, or having meaning, but so deep, mysterious and inhuman that it is impossible to open it.” Every thought and every movement in the face of death seems madness to the hero. Time seems to stop for him, and at this moment both life and death simultaneously become visible to him. However, Sergei, through an effort of will, still forces himself to do gymnastics.
Vasily Kashirin rushes around the cell, suffering as if from a toothache. It is noteworthy that he held his own better than others when preparations were underway for a terrorist attack, as he was inspired by the feeling of affirming “his daring and fearless will.”
In prison, he is suppressed by his own powerlessness. Thus, L.N. Andreev shows how the situation with which the hero approaches death affects the person’s very perception of this event.
The most intelligent member of the terrorist group is Werner, who knows several languages, has an excellent memory and a strong will. He decided to take a philosophical approach to death, because he did not know what fear was. At the trial, Werner does not think about death or even about life, but plays a difficult chess game. At the same time, he is not at all stopped by the fact that he may not finish the game. However, before his execution, he still mourns his comrades.
Along with the terrorists, two more murderers were sentenced to execution: Ivan Yanson, the worker who sent his master to the next world, and the robber Mishka Tsyganka. Before his death, Janson withdraws into himself and repeats the same phrase all the time: “I don’t need to be hanged.” The gypsy is offered to become an executioner himself and thereby buy his own life, but he hesitates. Depicts L.N. in detail. Andreev’s torment of the hero, who either imagines himself as an executioner, or is horrified by these thoughts: “... It became dark and stuffy, and the heart became a piece of unmelting ice, sending out small dry tremors.” One day, in a moment of extreme spiritual weakness, Gypsy howls with a trembling wolf howl. And this animal howl amazes with the horror and sorrow reigning in the soul of the Gypsy. If Janson is constantly in the same detached state, then the Gypsy, on the contrary, is haunted by contrasts: he either begs for mercy, then swears, then cheers up, then he is overwhelmed by wild cunning. “His human brain, placed on the monstrously sharp line between life and death, fell apart like a lump of dry and weathered clay,” writes L.N. Andreev, thereby emphasizing the idea that the personality of a person sentenced to death begins to disintegrate during his lifetime. A recurring detail in the story is symbolic: “Yanson constantly adjusts the dirty red scarf around his neck. Tanya Kovalchuk suggests that the freezing Vasily Kashirin tie a warm scarf around his neck, and Musa rubs a woolen collar on his neck.”
The main idea of the story is that each of us, in the face of death, must think about the main thing, that even the last minutes of human existence have a special meaning, perhaps the most important in life, revealing the essence of our personality. “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” was written in line with the mood of the early 20th century, when the theme of fate, fate, and the confrontation between life and death took center stage in literature. Transition, catastrophism, loss of social supports - all these features determined the relevance of the story's problems.
In his story “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” he wrote that it is not death that is terrible, but the knowledge of it. And with this work the writer expressed his loud protest against the death penalty.
Seven destinies... One death
Today we will look at the summary of "The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men." This is an incredibly poignant, touching and subtle work. It is filled with despair and the thirst for life that seizes every person sentenced to death. The characters evoke keen sympathy from the reader. This is probably exactly what Leonid Andreev wanted. “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men,” the summary of which we are discussing, will not leave anyone indifferent.
At one P.M...
So, we begin to describe “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men.” The chapter summaries will give you a complete understanding of this book.
It was supposed to be blown up at one o'clock in the afternoon. However, the conspirators were captured in time. The police prevented the assassination attempt. The minister himself was hastily sent to someone else's hospitable home, having previously informed him that the assassination attempt was to take place at one o'clock in the afternoon.
The minister knows that the danger of death has passed. But he will have no peace until this terrible, black-marked hour of the day passes. An obese man, who has experienced so much in his long life, reflects on the vicissitudes of fate. If he had not known about the impending assassination attempt, he would not have been shrouded in a sticky web of fear for his life. He would calmly drink coffee and get dressed. And they said: "At one o'clock in the afternoon,
But no one knows when he is destined to die. This knowledge is very painful. Ignorance, the minister is sure, is much more pleasant. Now they have saved him from death, but no one knows how long he has been given. A sudden attack could end his life at any moment. So death lurked in the corner of an unfamiliar apartment, as if waiting. The minister feels that it is becoming difficult for him to breathe...
Sentenced to death
We continue to describe the summary of “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men.” The chapter describes five conspirators who attempted to assassinate the minister.
Three men and one woman were arrested at the very entrance. Another was found in a safe house of which she was the owner. They were all young. The oldest member of the team was barely 28.
This 28-year-old boy turned out to be Sergei Golovin, the son of a colonel and a former officer. The expectation of death and internal experiences are practically not reflected on his young, healthy face. It still seems as happy and spiritual as before.
Musya, a 19-year-old girl, is very quiet and pale. In her appearance, the charm of youth fights with a severity surprising for her age. The shadow of fear of imminent death compresses her body into a tight string, forcing her to sit straight and motionless.
Next to Musya sits a short man who, as the judges believed, was the main instigator of the assassination attempt. His name is Werner. This short man is very handsome. There is a sense of strength and dignity in him. Even the judges treat him with some respect. His face is closed and does not express emotions. Is he afraid of death? Nothing can be read in the serious expression of his face.
Vasily Kashirin, on the contrary, is filled to the brim with horror. All his strength goes into fighting him. He tries not to show fear, but the voices of the judges seem to be heard from afar. He answers calmly and firmly, but immediately forgets both someone’s question and his answer.
The fifth terrorist, Tanya Kovalchuk, suffers from pain for each conspirator. She is very young, she has no children. But Tanya looks at everyone with maternal care and love. She is not afraid for her life. She doesn't care what happens to her.
The verdict has been passed. His painful wait is over.
"I don't need to be hanged"
And a few weeks before the terrorists were caught, another man, a peasant, was sentenced to death by hanging.
Ivan Janson is Estonian. He worked for two years for Russian owners as a farm laborer. The silent and sullen man often got drunk and flew into a rage, beating his horse with a whip.
One day his mind seemed to go blank. He himself did not expect such an act from himself. He locked the cook in the kitchen, and he entered the owner’s room and stabbed him in the back several times. He rushed to the mistress to rape her. But the woman turned out to be stronger and almost strangled him herself. Yanson ran into the field. An hour later he was caught. He squatted near the barn, trying to set it on fire with damp matches.
The owner died of blood poisoning 2 days later. Janson was sentenced to death for murder and attempted rape.
The judges sentence Ivan quickly. However, the man did not seem to understand what was happening around him. His gaze is sleepy and glassy. Only when the verdict is announced does he come to life. The scarf around his neck is choking, he frantically unties it.
I don’t need to be hanged,” he says confidently.
But the judges are already sending him to a cell.
Janson constantly inquires with the guards about when he will be hanged. The guards are surprised - this ridiculous, insignificant man seems so happy, as if he were not sentenced to hanging. For Yanson, execution seems like something distant, unreal, something not worth worrying about. Every day he annoys the guards with his question. And finally he receives an answer to it - a week later. Now Janson, who had again become sleepy and slow, truly believed in his imminent death. He just repeated: “I don’t need to be hanged.” However, a week later he, like the rest of the prisoners, will be led to execution.
Death of a Robber
Mikhail Golubets, nicknamed Mishka Tsyganok, committed many crimes during his short life. Now that he has been sentenced to death after killing three people, Mishka retains his characteristic audacity and cunning. The 17 days he spends in prison before his execution fly by quickly and unnoticed. He is in a hurry to live, realizing that there is not long left. His brain works quickly, his body requires movement.
A few days later, Mishka is visited by the warden, offering him the job of executioner. But Tsyganok is in no hurry to answer in the affirmative, although the robber really likes the picture that his fantasy paints. Soon a new executioner is found. The chance to escape has been lost forever.
The bear falls into despair. In the darkness of the cell, he falls on his face, howls like a wild animal, begging for mercy. The guard at his door becomes sick with horror. Then the robber jumped up and began swearing.
However, on the day of execution, Mishka becomes himself again. With the usual mockery, leaving the cell outside, he shouts:
The carriage of the Count of Bengal!
Last meeting
Those sentenced are allowed a final farewell to their families. Tanya, Musya and Werner have no one. And Sergei and Vasily must see their parents - the last and most painful meeting.
Sergei's father, Nikolai Sergeevich, persuades his wife to behave with dignity: “Kiss and be silent!” He understands how much pain their visit will cause his son. However, during the meeting, willpower cracks. Father and son cry and hug. Nikolai Sergeevich is proud of his son and blesses him for death.
Vasily's meeting with his mother is even more difficult. The father, a wealthy merchant who had had disagreements with his son all his life, did not come. The old mother can hardly stand on her feet. She blames Vasily for conspiring with terrorists, but at the same time she does not want to overshadow the last meeting with reproaches. They, as before, do not find a common language. Vasily feels that a long-standing grudge against his parents does not let him go, even if it seems too petty in the face of death.
The old lady finally left. For a long time she wandered around the city, not seeing the road. Grief overwhelmed her. Having just realized that Vasily will be hanged, she wants to return, but falls to the ground. She no longer has the strength to get up.
"Death is not the end"
The last chapter of the story "The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men". By reading the summary of this chapter, the reader will become more familiar with the youngest and most selfless heroine - Musya.
And the prisoners await their terrible fate. Tanya, who has worried about others all her life, does not think about herself even now. She is worried about Musya, who, looking like a boy in a large prison dress, is suffering from painful anticipation. It seems to Musa that she was not allowed to perform a sacrificial act, that she was not allowed to die the death of a martyr. They did not allow themselves to be elevated to the rank of saints. But if a person is valuable not only for what he does, but also for what he wanted to do... Is she really worthy of the sympathy and respect of other people? Those who will mourn her death. The death she must accept as punishment for her brave and selfless act? With a blissful smile on his lips, Musya falls asleep...
Conclusion
So today we looked at The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men. The summary and analysis of this work, alas, cannot contain the feelings and emotions of the characters that Andreev conveyed to the readers. This is a subtle psychological story that teaches you to appreciate and love life.
“The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” by L. Andreev is a deep, psychologically subtle, original work. This is the story of seven people waiting to be hanged and eventually executed. Five of them are political criminals and terrorists. One is a thief and a failed rapist, and the seventh is simply a robber.
The writer traces the “path” of these very different criminals from trial to execution. Andreev is interested not so much in their external life as in their internal life: the awareness of these people that they will soon die, that death awaits them, their behavior,
Their thoughts. All this develops into the author’s philosophical reflection on death in general, its essence, manifestations, and its deep connection with life.
One of those hanged, Sergei Golovin, belonged to the five terrorists. He was still a very young man. His main quality, which the author emphasizes, was youth, youth and health. This young man loved life in all its manifestations: he rejoiced in the sun, light, delicious food, his strong and agile body, the feeling that he had a whole life ahead of him, which he could devote to something high and beautiful.
Golovin was the son of a retired colonel, himself a former officer. And he, who had sworn an oath of allegiance to the sovereign, now chose a different field for himself - to fight the tsarist regime. But it seems to me that he was led to this not by conviction in the correctness of the ideas of terrorism, but simply by the desire for something romantic, sublime, worthy. And now Golovin is paying for his actions - he was sentenced to hanging.
At the trial, this hero behaved calmly and even somehow detachedly. He looked at the spring-blue sky, at the sun breaking through the court window, and thought about something. Golovin thought concentratedly and intensely, as if not wanting to hear what was happening in court, fencing himself off from it. And only in moments did he lose control and return to real events. Then “an earthy, deathly blue appeared; and the fluffy hair, painfully torn out of its nest, squeezed, as if in a vice, in the fingers that turned white at the tip.” But the love of life and the joy of youth immediately won. And again Golovin’s gaze became joyful.
It is interesting that even the judges felt the purity and wonderful cheerfulness of this hero. The author writes that they “felt sorry” for Golovin. Sergei reacted to the verdict calmly, but with some naive annoyance, as if he had not expected it: “The devil take them, they hanged them after all.”
Golovin had to endure many difficult trials in anticipation of death. Perhaps the most difficult thing for him was to survive the meeting with his family. Sergei loved his parents very much, respected and pitied them. He could not imagine how he would see his father and mother for the last time, how they would survive this pain. Golovin’s heart was simply breaking. During the meeting, Sergei’s father stood strong, tried to ease his son’s suffering and support him. Therefore, he stopped the hero’s mother when she could not stand it and began to break down into tears or lamentations. But Nikolai Sergeevich himself could not fully endure this torture: he burst into tears on his son’s shoulder, saying goodbye to him and blessing him for death.
Golovin also held on and held on with all his might. And only when his parents left, he lay down on the bed and cried for a long time until he fell asleep.
Next, the author describes the moment the hero waits for death in the cell, moments of waiting and reflection. Golovin never thought about death; he was completely immersed in life. His comrades loved him for his purity, naivety, romance, and strength. And he himself made big plans. And suddenly - a death sentence, death inexorably approaching. At first, the hero was saved by the thought that another stage of his life had arrived, the goal of which was “to die well.” For some time this distracted Sergei from painful thoughts. He was busy training, moving, that is, drowning out the fear of death with life. But gradually this became not enough.
The fear of death began to haunt the hero. At first these were short moments, “gradually and somehow in jerks.” Then the fear began to grow to enormous proportions. The body, the young healthy body of the hero did not want to die. And then Sergei decided to weaken it so that it would not give such strong signals about its desire to live. But this only helped for a while. Golovin began to have thoughts that he had never even thought about before. The young man began to think about the value of life, about its unbearable beauty.
When there were only a few hours left before the execution, Sergei fell into a strange state - it was not yet death, but it was no longer life. A state of emptiness and detachment from the thought that now he, Sergei Golovin, exists, but after a while he will not exist. And this began to feel like you were going crazy, that your body was not your body, and so on. Andreev writes that Golovin reached a state of some kind of insight - in his fear he touched something incomprehensible, God himself. And after this, the hero felt some kind of calm, he became cheerful again, returned to exercise, as if he had discovered some secret for himself.
Until the very end, until his death, Golovin remained true to himself: calm, childishly naive, pure in soul and cheerful. He rejoiced at the good weather, the spring day, and the unity, albeit the last, with his comrades.
The hero goes to his death first, silently, with dignity, supporting his comrade Vasily Kashirin.
The ending of the story is scary and lyrical at the same time. Life went on - the sun rose over the sea, and at this time the corpses of the hanged heroes were taken out. The mutilated bodies of these people were taken away along the same road along which they were brought alive. And nothing has changed in nature. Only life already flows on without these people, and they will never enjoy its charm again.
Such a detail as Sergei Golovin’s lost galosh becomes piercingly sad. Only she sadly accompanied the terrible procession on its final journey.
I think that in this story Andreev appears as a humanist and philosopher. He shows that death is the most terrible and incomprehensible thing that can happen in human life, the most difficult thing for human consciousness. Why and why do people strive for it, which is so inevitably approaching?
The writer puts his characters in a critical situation and observes how they behave in it. Not everyone meets their death with dignity. I think that Sergei Golovin is among the “worthy”. Having survived the crisis, he decided something for himself, understood something and accepted death with dignity.
It is curious that only seven were executed. This number carries a lot of meaning in Orthodoxy, for example. This is a mystical number, and it is precisely this number that Andreev chooses for his observation of people and human nature. It seems to me that the writer himself draws the following conclusion: not everyone can withstand the test of death. Only those who have some kind of support, an idea for which they are ready to die, pass it. And this idea is life and death for the sake of people, for the good of humanity.
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Leonid Andreev
The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men
Dedicated to L. I. Tolstoy
"1. AT ONE AFTERNOON, YOUR EXCELLENCY"
Since the minister was a very obese man, prone to apoplexy, with all precautions, avoiding causing dangerous excitement, he was warned that a very serious attempt was being prepared on his life. Seeing that the minister greeted the news calmly and even with a smile, they also reported the details: the assassination attempt was to take place the next day, in the morning, when he leaves with a report; Several terrorists, already betrayed by the provocateur and now under the vigilant surveillance of detectives, must gather at the entrance at one o'clock in the afternoon with bombs and revolvers and wait for his exit. This is where they will be captured.
Wait,” the minister was surprised, “how do they know that I will go at one o’clock in the afternoon with a report, when I myself only found out about it the day before?”
The head of security waved his hands vaguely:
Exactly at one o'clock in the afternoon, Your Excellency.
Either surprised or approving of the actions of the police, who arranged everything so well, the minister shook his head and smiled gloomily with his thick dark lips; and with the same smile, obediently, not wanting to further interfere with the police, he quickly got ready and left to spend the night in someone else’s hospitable palace. Also taken away from the dangerous house, near which the bomb throwers will gather tomorrow, were his wife and two children.
While the lights were burning in a strange palace and friendly, familiar faces were bowing, smiling and indignant, the dignitary experienced a feeling of pleasant excitement - as if he had already been given or would now be given a great and unexpected reward. But the people left, the lights went out, and through the mirrored glass the lacy and ghostly light of electric lanterns lay on the ceiling and walls; a stranger to the house, with its paintings, statues and the silence that entered from the street, he himself was quiet and vague, he awakened an alarming thought about the futility of locks, guards and walls. And then at night, in the silence and loneliness of someone else’s bedroom, the dignitary became unbearably afraid.
There was something wrong with his kidneys, and with every strong excitement, his face, legs and arms became filled with water and swollen, and from this he seemed to become even larger, even thicker and more massive. And now, towering over the crushed springs of the bed like a mountain of swollen meat, he, with the melancholy of a sick person, felt his swollen, as if someone else’s, face and persistently thought about the cruel fate that people were preparing for him. He remembered, one after another, all the recent terrible cases when bombs had been thrown at people of his dignitary and even higher position, and the bombs had torn bodies to shreds, splashed brains on dirty brick walls, knocked teeth out of their sockets. And from these Memories, one’s own corpulent, sick body, stretched out on the bed, seemed already alien, already experiencing the fiery force of an explosion; and it seemed as if the arms were separated from the body at the shoulders, the teeth were falling out, the brain was being divided into particles, the legs were going numb and lying obediently, with their toes up, like those of a dead person. He moved vigorously, breathed loudly, coughed so as not to resemble a dead man, surrounded himself with the living noise of ringing springs and a rustling blanket; and to show that he was completely alive, not a bit dead and far from death, like any other person, he loudly and abruptly boomed in the silence and loneliness of the bedroom:
Well done! Well done! Well done!
It was he who praised the detectives, the police and the soldiers, all those who protected his life and so timely, so cleverly prevented the murder. But moving, but praising, but smiling with a violent, crooked smile to express his mockery of the stupid loser terrorists, he still did not believe in his salvation, in the fact that life would not suddenly, immediately, leave him. The death that people had planned for him and which was only in their thoughts, in their intentions, as if it was already standing here, and will stand, and will not leave until they are captured, the bombs are taken away from them and they are put in a strong prison . She stands in that corner and doesn’t leave - she can’t leave, like an obedient soldier, put on guard by someone’s will and order.
At one o'clock in the afternoon, Your Excellency! - the spoken phrase sounded, shimmering into all the voices: now cheerful and mocking, now angry, now stubborn and stupid. It was as if they had placed a hundred wound-up gramophones in the bedroom, and all of them, one after another, with the idiotic diligence of a machine, shouted out the words ordered to them:
At one o'clock in the afternoon, Your Excellency.
And this tomorrow’s “hour of the day”, which until so recently was no different from others, was only a calm movement of the hand along the dial of a gold watch, suddenly acquired an ominous conviction, jumped out of the dial, began to live separately, stretched out like a huge black pillar for the rest of its life. cutting in two. It was as if no other hours existed either before him or after him, and he alone, arrogant and self-important, had the right to some kind of special existence.
Well? What do you want? - the minister asked angrily through clenched teeth.
The gramophones screamed:
At one o'clock in the afternoon, Your Excellency! - And the black pillar grinned and bowed.
Gritting his teeth, the minister rose up in bed and sat down, resting his face on his palms - he could not sleep that disgusting night.
And with terrifying brightness, clutching his face with his plump, perfumed palms, he imagined how tomorrow morning he would get up, not knowing anything, then drink coffee, not knowing anything, then get dressed in the hallway. And neither he, nor the doorman who served the fur coat, nor the footman who brought the coffee, would have known that it is completely pointless to drink coffee, put on a fur coat, when in a few moments all this: the fur coat, and his body, and the coffee that is in him, will be destroyed by explosion, taken by death. Here the doorman opens the glass door... And it is he, the sweet, kind, affectionate doorman, who has blue soldier’s eyes and medals all over his chest, who opens the terrible door with his own hands - he opens it because he knows nothing. Everyone smiles because they don't know anything.
Wow! - he suddenly said loudly and slowly moved his palms away from his face.
And, looking into the darkness, far in front of him, with a stopped, intense gaze, he just as slowly extended his hand, groped for the horn and turned on the light. Then he got up and, without putting on his shoes, walked around the strange unfamiliar bedroom with his bare feet on the carpet, found another horn from the wall lamp and lit it. It became light and pleasant, and only the disturbed bed with the blanket falling to the floor spoke of some kind of horror that had not yet completely passed.
In nightwear, with a beard tousled from restless movements, with angry eyes, the dignitary looked like any other angry old man who has insomnia and severe shortness of breath. It was as if the death that people were preparing for him had exposed him, torn him away from the pomp and impressive splendor that surrounded him - and it was difficult to believe that he had so much power, that this body of his, such an ordinary, simple human body, should have It’s scary to die in the fire and roar of a monstrous explosion. Without dressing and not feeling the cold, he sat down in the first chair he came across, propped up his tousled beard with his hand and concentratedly, in deep and calm thoughtfulness, stared at the unfamiliar stucco ceiling.
So that's the thing! So that's why he was so scared and so excited! So that's why she stands in the corner and doesn't leave and can't leave!
Fools! - he said contemptuously and weightily.
Fools! - he repeated louder and slightly turned his head towards the door so that those to whom this concerned could hear. And this applied to those whom he recently called well done and who, in excess of zeal, told him in detail about the impending assassination attempt.
Well, of course,” he thought deeply, with a suddenly stronger and smoother thought, “now that they told me, I know and I’m scared, but then I wouldn’t know anything and would calmly drink coffee. Well, and then, of course, this death - but am I really so afraid of death? My kidneys hurt, and I’ll die someday, but I’m not afraid, because I don’t know anything. And these fools said: at one o'clock in the afternoon, Your Excellency. And they thought, fools, that I would be happy, but instead she stood in the corner and did not leave. It doesn't go away because it's my thought. And it is not death that is terrible, but the knowledge of it; and it would be completely impossible to live if a person could quite accurately and definitely know the day and hour when he would die. And these fools warn: “At one o’clock in the afternoon, Your Excellency!?”
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The road to execution becomes a death row for those sentenced. |
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Olga Egoshina. . The Tabakerka staged “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” ( New news, November 28, 2005). Roman Dolzhansky. . “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” by Mindaugas Karbauskis (Kommersant, November 29, 2005). Alexander Sokolyansky. . “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” on the stage of the Oleg Tabakov Theater ( News Time, 11/29/2005). Gleb Sitkovsky. . "The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men" at the "Snuffbox" became one of the best performances of the season ( Newspaper, 11/29/2005). Oleg Zintsov. . At the O. Tabakov Theater they talked about seven hanged people ( Vedomosti, 11/30/2005). Marina Davydova. ( Izvestia, 30.11.2005). Alena Karas. . Mindaugas Karbauskis dramatized "The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men" ( RG, 01.12.2005). Svetlana Khokhryakova. . "The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men." Version by Mindaugas Karbauskis ( Culture, 01.12.2005). Marina Zayonts. . "The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men" at the Tabakerka Theater ( Results, 05.12.2005). Alla Shenderova. Mindaugas Karbauskis staged his most passionate and life-affirming performance – “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” ( Actor's House, No. 1, 2006). |
The Story of the Seven Hanged Men. Theater directed by O. Tabakov. Press about the performance
New News, November 28, 2005
Olga Egoshina
Minutes of the present
“The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” was staged at the Tabakerka
The famous director Mindaugas Karbauskis staged Leonid Andreev’s “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” in “Snuffbox”. Taking the darkest work of the most frightening Russian writer, the young director created a smart and bright performance about the most important thing - the ability to die.
Whatever director Mindaugas Karbauskis staged the play about, it certainly turns out that the director “thinks about death,” sometimes jokes with it, sometimes “pulls its mustache.” He is worried about death not as a physical process: the last wheezing, spasms, writhing. And not Hamlet’s curiosity: what dreams will you have in that death sleep? He is concerned about death as a philosophical speculation. As something that people exist next to, rarely being aware of its presence. Death can turn into a cat calling Pulcheria Ivanovna in “Old World Landowners.” It could become a mother’s coffin, carried across the country by her husband and children. Leonid Andreev’s “The Story of the Seven Hanged Men” describes in detail the types and stages of relationships with death for seven different types of people sentenced to death. Karbauskis simply could not pass by this work.
On the stage there is an inclined black platform covered with white letters, reminiscent of an open page of a book. The characters appear on it as a condensation of the author's text. The words of a story are heard about a minister who was told that an assassination attempt was being prepared on him tomorrow, about five terrorist revolutionaries betrayed by an agent provocateur, about an employee who killed the owner and was caught attempting arson, about the robber and horse thief Gypsy. Having inherited from his teacher Pyotr Fomenko the masterly ease of contact with prose, Karbauskis carves out the monolith of the performance from Andreev’s rather loose story.
Having told about the character, the actors easily move from the third person to their heroes, suddenly pulling them over themselves, like the cheerful robber Tsyganok pulls on his hat. Dmitry Kulichkov, playing the horse thief Gypsy, is now, perhaps, one of the most serious theatrical hopes. It is his performance that becomes the tuning fork of the production. Without omitting a single nuance, he leads the line of the role easily, without slipping into pathos or melodrama. One of the most powerful and well-made scenes of this powerful and well-made performance: the scene where the Gypsy is persuaded to become an executioner, promising life for it. Kulichkov accurately plays this temptation of the soul: the temptation of the red shirt, the temptation of power. And only somewhere in the completely unimaginable depths of the dark robber soul is some kind of disturbing shame from the very word “executioner.”
The director accurately and clearly builds every detail of people's attitude towards the upcoming execution. And the stupid stubbornness of the silent killer Yanson (Alexander Vorobyov), convincing everyone: “Meinya can’t be found!” And the childish delight of a terrorist nicknamed Musya (Yana Sexte), who dreams of execution as a martyr’s crown. And the iron will of the main revolutionary Werner (Alexei Komashko), who plays a mental chess game, pushing away the horror of the approaching end. And the lowing fear of Vasily Kashirin (Alexey Usoltsev). And Sergei Golovin’s (Alexander Skotnikov) struggle with his own body: he enthusiastically does gymnastics in order to realize with despair that now his muscular body is better off weakening, going to nothing, otherwise it’s too unnatural to think about death when every vein is playing.
The presence of near death changes the perception of the simplest actions. The last meeting with the parents, the last hug of the condemned and the feeling of brotherly compassion for the unknown thug. The proximity of death definitely removes everything superficial and random in people, in their lives. And these moments of the present are probably the main thing that Karbauskis is looking for, for the sake of which he again and again introduces Death as the main character in his productions.
Kommersant, November 29, 2005
Death is so much fun
"The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men" by Mindaugas Karbauskis
The theater, under the direction of Oleg Tabakov, presented the premiere of the play “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” based on the work of the same name by Leonid Andreev. The production was performed by Mindaugas Karbauskis. Unexpectedly, ROMAN DOLZHANSKY was not only afraid at the performance, but also laughed.
It is generally accepted that director Mindaugas Karbauskis voluntarily chose the theme of death as the main theme of his work. And it’s true that the director’s best performances, such as “Old World Landowners” at the Moscow Art Theater, “The Long Christmas Lunch” and “When I Was Dying” at the Oleg Tabakov Theater, seem to be staged about how death comes upon life, leaving the latter no chances. Wits are already predicting for Mr. Karbauskis in the near future productions of “The Death of Ivan Ilyich”, “The Girl and Death” and other works in which a six-letter word, if not included in the title, then determines the course of events and the outcome to which the action strives.
Andreevsky's "Tale of the Seven Hanged Men" seems to fit perfectly into this list. In fact, the performance staged in “Snuffbox” allows us to clarify and even refute what is usually written about Mindaugas Karbauskis. Revaluation does not apply to the profession: the best aspects of the talent of Pyotr Fomenko’s student, who works in Oleg Tabakov’s theater holding, remained with him. This is the ability to somewhat dryly, but inventively and tastefully build the overall picture of the performance, fitting into it memorable and distinct characters. This is the ability to work with supposedly non-stage prose - Mr. Karbauskis did not tailor a play from Andreev, he left the performance as a story, entrusting the characters with not only direct, but also indirect speech and teaching them to move very naturally from one to the other.
The main topic itself requires rethinking. Mindaugas Karbauskis is not staging a play about death. Following Leonid Andreev, he could repeat: “If before I thought that only death exists, now I am beginning to guess that only life exists.” Like the author, Karbauskis does not have any gallows or rope loops. But the final words about the elongated necks, blue tongues and insanely staring eyes of the story’s characters sound like nothing more than literature. The director “clung” to the proximity to the place of execution of the sea. He makes it seem as if the seven doomed are separated from earthly life not by the hand of the executioner, but by a sea wave. It rolls with sound onto the chipped parquet platform, raised by the artist Maria Mitrofanova like a breakwater or a sloping rock. And the hanged men disappear into the elements as if they themselves were cheerfully dissolving into the waves - in order to repeat the scene from the prologue in the finale, in which they, young and united by a common cause, run into the house from the cold, exchanging exclamations and kisses.
What kind of business they had, the director doesn’t care. He does not talk about terrorists (by the way, Gorky at one time severely reproached the author for the fact that his heroes did not think about their struggle before they died) and does not discuss the legality of the death penalty. One of the main themes of the play is the interchangeability of people, that is, that great game of life, in which, of course, one can recognize the hand of death, but it is more interesting to look for a universal theatrical game. Therefore, future suicide bombers initially play the domestic servant of the very minister whom the terrorists failed to blow up. Then some of them play the parents of others - in very powerful scenes of suicide bombers saying goodbye to their families. And the predatory and life-loving robber Tsyganok and the slow Estonian peasant Janson, who are attached to the terrorists, generally alternately turn into jailers for each other.
Thanks to the not-too-complicated acting, the director manages to avoid, on the one hand, the deliberate gloom that could be expected from a non-grossing title, and on the other hand, that cheap sentimentality that is worse than the gallows in the theater today. The clever balance set by the director is supported by the actors, most of whom are very young. Particularly good is the sharp, collected Dmitry Kulichkov in the role of the dangerous and cheerful Gypsy. Thanks to them, the humor incorporated into the performance by the director also looks appropriate. Sometimes “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” generally makes me laugh (Gypsy, looking at Yanson who killed his master, wonders: “And how are they allowed to kill people like that?!”). Which is quite natural: playing, especially in the presence of death, is more interesting and fun than just dying. The audience laughs at first cautiously, with distrust of themselves and the theater - is it possible to smile when it comes to death? Gentlemen, viewers, laugh your heart out. Anything is possible in the theater, especially when done with talent.
Vremya Novostei, November 29, 2005
Alexander Sokolyansky
It's absolutely terrible to die, mind you.
“The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” on the stage of the Oleg Tabakov Theater
In the direction of Mindaugas Karbauskis, the starting and supporting thought is always the thought of human mortality, experienced as a shock. The audience has gotten used to it, the critics are tired of writing about it, the director himself does not seem to take into account what is being said and written about him. Or, on the contrary, he waits for the obvious to reach the audience: the difference between the premise and the results of a theatrical statement. The performance, based on the prose of Leonid Andreev, makes life easier for the audience: it is impossible to ignore the transposition of the original theme, the difference between conclusions and premises. The director does not argue with the author's vision, but accepts its insufficiency, his blindness as a condition of his own work.
Andreev, no doubt, is a secondary writer. It is difficult to love him, and perhaps this is precisely why he is dear to the courageous director Karbauskis, who always wants to stand up for the unloved. When Andreev writes in his diary about his “partial genius” and about the painful confusion of feelings as an almost indispensable condition for inspired work (“Sick, stunned after drunkenness, without thinking, I wrote “The Seven Hanged Men” /.../ One evening I cried almost entirely and wrote three or four lines"), Karbauskis takes the author at his word. Where one can see weakness, frayed nerves, unpleasant wagging of words, the director wants to see only the insecurity of a person guided by intuition and very compassionate by nature. The fact that Andreev likes to feel sorry for himself does not offend a theater person, but, on the contrary, explains the qualities of prose, which, contrary to the author’s conscious intentions, was desperately sentimental and only superficially philosophical.
Mindaugas Karbauskis invaded the author’s logic of “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” only once, but very decisively. Andreev’s characters are clearly divided into suicide bombers and everyone else. Death row inmates are those who live in anticipation of execution. These are five terrorists who attempted to assassinate the minister; give or take the minister whom they attempted to assassinate (he was supposed to be blown up at 13.00, he just can’t forget about it); give or take the dashing robber Gypsy, who is almost not afraid of death; plus or minus the semi-sane farmhand Yanson, who himself doesn’t know why he stabbed his owner, and repeats “they’re not going to hang me” like a spell. Everyone else - judges, guards, parents, etc., right down to the nameless executioner ( The gypsy was offered this job, he almost agreed) - they live without thinking at all about their doom and are content with its abstraction: someday, somehow, well, never mind, the episode, of course, is unpleasant, but we will all be there. In Karbauskis’s play episodic roles are played by the same actors who play the eight executed, and no one is protected from mortal fear. It is important that his constant presence, his oppressive and heartbreaking inexorability ultimately turn into hope for immortality: since it is impossible to live like this (and indeed it is impossible) , one should think that human existence is structured in a different, not at all meaningless, way.
Leonid Andreev's story opens up the opportunity to protest non-existence. “Maybe for some people there is death. For now, and then it won’t happen at all,” says Werner, the wisest of terrorists. In Karbauskis's performance this possibility becomes a given. More precisely, it could have been if fear and hope had been played out with the necessary force that did not tolerate objections, with a firm knowledge of the goal of the game. To say that this power is not given to the actors - Alexander Vorobyov (Yanson), Dmitry Kulichkov (Gypsy), Pavel Ilyin (Minister), Yana Sexta (terrorist Musya) - would be cruel and reckless, but one cannot do without reproaching them.
From an acting point of view, “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” is very polished. The main part of Andreev's narrative consists of psychological portraits of the characters. They are written sharply, effectively and clearly, they offer the actor a lot of clues, and the temptation to drag the game on himself becomes irresistible. There is no central figure here, and each performer feels the right to be in charge for a few minutes, to occupy the audience’s attention with his demonstrative performance. This is pleasant for the actors and, most likely, useful for intratheater life (intelligent pragmatism is one of Karbauskis's directorial virtues), but demonstration performances can be tolerable only as long as they do not obscure the overall meaning of the performance. It is interesting to note that Karbauskis, the director is generally quite tough and domineering, is still making peace and does not interfere with the actors’ ability to express themselves. Perhaps it is important for him to wait for some qualitative change; it is also possible that his compassion for the characters of Leonid Andreev and Andreev himself extended to the performers - they also want to live, and who is he to strictly declare: live not in your own way, but in accordance with the general meaning.
Actually, he is a director, and perhaps the most serious and strong one of his generation; the ability to say “do as I command” is part of his professional responsibilities. But the ability to understand that demandingness is not very timely is also included.
Therefore, perhaps, in “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” a wonderful mise-en-scène arises, reconciling everyone with everything. The tilted parquet floor, invented by Maria Mitrofanova - shiny and cold, throughout the entire performance perceived as an emblem of officialdom - turns out to be like an ice slide, and the characters, one after another, plop down on the parquet with their bellies, slide down, having fun like children, although not quite as children. Rather, as partakers of eternal life, who still remember the short-term joys of childhood. Like people who are lucky enough to know the fear of death in its entirety and understand that in general there is nothing to be afraid of.
Newspaper, November 29, 2005
Gleb Sitkovsky
Will end with a hanger
"The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men" at the "Snuffbox" became one of the best performances of the season
All reviewers without exception will say that, having staged the story by Leonid Andreev, director Mindaugas Karbauskis integrated into the series of his performances another work on the topic of human death - and they will be right. Karbauskis himself is right when he said a few days ago in an interview with Gazeta that all his productions are not about death, but about life. Having become one of his most existential performances, “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” speaks of both life and death, and also about the thin red line that lies between them.
Written in 1908, Leonid Andreev’s story was incredibly relevant at that time - it’s no wonder that it was based on newspaper clippings about the executions of revolutionaries that swept across the country. Suffice it to say that Leo Tolstoy’s article “I Can’t Be Silent”, devoted to the same issues, was written almost simultaneously with Andreev’s short story. Over the course of a century, the smell of newspaper ink has disappeared from the story almost completely, although not completely: when the word “terrorist” is uttered on stage or they talk about explosive belts, we have something to think about. But all this is true, by the way, without interfering with the main thing. And the main thing here is that it is clear: a person is awaiting death.
It is a person - one, not seven. Martin Heidegger has the idea that there is no alien death for anyone living. Death is always “my death.” Therefore, when five revolutionaries and two criminals are led together to execution, it is not scary. Of course, it is humanly possible to sympathize with the hanged people, but nothing more. It’s scary when each of us, sentenced to death, is left alone with himself, preparing for the very moment for which he was born. “The meaning of life,” reasoned the heroine of Karbauskis’s previous play based on Faulkner’s novel “As I Lay Dying,” “is to prepare to be dead for a long time.” In “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” by Karbauskis, these preparations are continued: rigidly cutting off everything superficial and false that is in Leonid Andreev’s story, the director reduced his performance only to these, the most important minutes.
Kama Ginkas follows approximately the same paths as Karbauskis in our theater from play to play. “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” gave many reasons to remember Ginkas’s previous works – primarily about “The Execution of the Decembrists,” of course, but not only. Like Ginkas, Karbauskis does not allow his actors (Alexander Vorobyov, Dmitry Kulichkov, Alexander Skotnikov, Yana Sexte - even rewrite the entire program: they are all so good, they are all accurate) to completely merge with the characters in the story, encouraging them to talk about “suicide bombers” in the third person . After all, they, young and beautiful, are not playing terrorists - they are turning over old pages, using them as an excuse to fantasize about their own death. Here everything merged: the childish “I’m going to die, and then you’ll see everything,” and the bottomless, throat-pitying self-pity for one’s young (or flabby, it doesn’t matter) body, and something else - unknowable, transcendental . All the time an attempt is made to go beyond the limits of one’s own body and look around with curiosity: where will I be when my body with a swollen blue tongue falls from the crossbar? Just like the characters in Ginkas’ plays (“K.I. from “Crime”, “Notes from Underground”), Karbauskis’ actors try to reach someone by slamming their palms on the wall. In terms of the plot, it seems like a prison knocking of prisoners placed in solitary confinement, but it looks much more like a hopeless effort to escape from the solitary confinement of one’s own flesh.
At the end of the play, after all seven of the hanged men have received what they deserve, Mindaugas Karbauskis' actors will leave to return. They will come in from the cold, flushed, chilled, and, taking off their coats, hang them on a hanger. They will count - there are exactly seven coats. This is what the story is about, hanging on a hanger. Throw off your bodies like an unnecessary shell, which for the time being protected from the winter cold, and go warm up - as you want, and this is a great idea. Apparently, Karbauskis really does not stage his performances about death.
Vedomosti, November 30, 2005
Oleg Zintsov
Character with a noose around his neck
At the O. Tabakov Theater they talked about seven hanged people
“The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men,” played in a basement on Chaplygina Street, tempts you to reach into your pocket for the usual joke: well, again Mindaugas Karbauskis harnessed his favorite horse, increasing the number of deaths in his track record. But, firstly, no joke, but the performances of the best Moscow director from the generation of 30-year-olds always require serious conversation. And secondly, why not harness it when it’s riding so nicely?
To say that the new performance is a life-affirming thing would be overkill, but not much. And certainly not a mistake. This production cannot be denied its calm and intelligent gaiety; Her humor is not at all gallows, and there is no room for despair in her.
The plot of Leonid Andreev is awaiting execution: five young terrorist revolutionaries who were preparing an assassination attempt on the minister will share the fate with two criminals, but the minister himself, who learned that at exactly 13.00 he was to be blown up, is firmly attached to the thought of his own death.
The plot of Mindaugas Karbauskis is getting used to nothingness, an attempt to guess the meaning in it, clarifying something in oneself and in life. Dying for his characters is very scary, but also interesting. The idea that death is the continuation of life by other means looks like a monstrous truism on paper, but in the performances of Mindaugas Karbauskis it is organic and somehow self-evident.
Writer Leonid Andreev is not able to offer much to the director, but Karbauskis doesn’t need much from him: he knows the benefits of self-restraint and knows how to find his theatrical interest within the framework proposed by the author.
Andreev uses a simple scheme: each of his heroes represents a certain psychological type, the essence of which is revealed in a borderline situation - the expectation of death. Mindaugas Karbauskis changes the rules of the game in the simplest theatrical way: his actors easily move from first to third person and, in addition, try on different roles - here they are servants, comically mincing with trays after the minister, and here they are terrorists, waiting in solitary confinement for the execution of a sentence . Death remains a private event, clarifying the character of each character, giving it its final form. But at the same time, it is also divided equally among everyone: the difference in waiting time becomes insignificant - and this generalization occurs naturally and delicately.
Another motif that clearly emerges in the performance’s design is also delicately executed: be like children, and you will enter, if not into the Kingdom of Heaven, then certainly to a place where it will be calm, easy and not painful at all. In the finale, death will lick the seven executed by the sea surf, noisy on the soundtrack, and before that, the entire action will be smoothly and softly stitched with episodes of childish games: the characters either throw pillows at each other, or slide down on their stomachs on the inclined platform, which is at the beginning and end of the performance turns out to be huge pages of an open book. As usual for Karbauskis, the mise-en-scenes of the prologue and epilogue are looped, in which the characters, who look like high school students, somewhere in the background, enter the room from the cold, warm their hands, take off their coats and place them on a hanger - otherwise where?
A nice touch, by the way, to the director’s portrait of Mindaugas Karbauskis, who is able to remarkably reconcile metaphysics with craft, that is, at the same time remembering how life ends and where theater begins.
Izvestia, November 30, 2005
Marina Davydova
The deadly number will not work
The hope of the Russian stage Mindaugas Karbauskis staged Leonid Andreev's "The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men" at the Tabakerka. He turned the famous writer's social pamphlet about terrorists and executions into a philosophical play about people and life.
Leonid Andreev was more popular than Anton Chekhov at the beginning of the century. He was the ruler of thoughts. He was considered one of his own among both symbolists and realists, absorbed all the trends of the time, and responded to all pressing social issues. One of these questions is painfully reminiscent of the damned question of our days. In Russia at the turn of the century there was a general craze for bombing. Five of the seven hanged in Andreev's story are terrorists. And since a progressive writer at the beginning of the century was supposed to sympathize with the fighters for the people's happiness, all five are covered here with a romantic flair and equipped with a martyr's aura. Each of them experiences a moment of weakness. Everyone has their own Garden of Gethsemane and their own way of the cross. But everyone calmly and resignedly accepts the execution. The five saviors (with a small letter, of course) are framed in the story by two robbers - the brainless Yanson (Alexander Vorobyov) and the dashing Tsyganok (Dmitry Kulichkov), who experiences some kind of awakening of the soul before death. The reflection of the sacrificial death of five, of course, falls on these victims of the state machine, far from any ideals. Andreev’s verdict on the regime is decisive and irrevocable; his sympathy for the unsuccessful bomb throwers is beyond doubt.
Karbauskis, who has already shown death on stage more than once in its most varied guises ("Old World Landowners", "When She Was Dying"), decisively eliminated not only the social component from Andreev's prose. He also removed Christian reminiscences from it. He staged a play not about heroes, not about murderers, not about repression and not even about death, as one might expect. He staged a play about overcoming fear of her...
The sloping black platform on which the action takes place is densely dotted with white lines. The heroes of the new theatrical work are born from Andreev’s dense prose, like the cosmos from the original chaos. The artists tell the story, turning the text from the author into the text of the character, moving from the third person to the first, outlining the characters with spare but expressive strokes. The last thing that is important in these characteristics is the terrorist background of the heroes. It is no coincidence that at the beginning of the play, would-be revolutionaries walk in a flock around the house of the minister (Pavel Ilyin), on whom an assassination attempt is being prepared, handing him a glass on a tray and straightening his pillow. Here they are servants, and now they are defendants. Here he is the boss, and here he is a mere mortal consumed by fear.
We are all condemned. All without exception. Knowing the exact time is only an additional condition of the sentence. But just as the nearness of the beloved makes the lover tremble, the nearness of death makes the living tremble...
Karbauskis generally loves shifters and the game of ambivalence. In The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men, this game determines the essence of the matter.
Andreev's heroes are hanged on the seashore. In Karbauskis they go into death, as into the sea. And this is an absolutely amazing image, because the sea, wavering and breathing, usually symbolizes life. But in the play "Snuff Boxes" the boundary between them is blurred. And then the dead suddenly emerge from oblivion and, with a joyful squeal, roll down the platform, like children on a snowy slide. To them, who stoically accepted death, the director contrasts not the impersonal state machine, but precisely that the person is the very minister on whom the convicts attempted to assassinate. In the story, he, already knowing that the assassination attempt was prevented, continues to wait with trepidation for the fateful hour. The thought of possible death completely deprives him of his will. Andreev skillfully describes this fear, but quickly forgets about the bearer of fear. But Karbauskis doesn’t forget. In the finale, the high rank will sit limply at the head of the bed, his eyes will be closed and he will be covered with a rough blanket. And this unexpected and smart move puts everything in its place.
Those who overcome the fear of death will live. He who is afraid of her will die. Those who know the joy of life do not have death. Those who do not know will die an eternal death.
This performance about execution is an amazing hymn to existence, allowing you to understand a simple and important thing. Today's terrorists, black suicide bombers and female suicide bombers are also not afraid of death. But they are not afraid only because they love her more than life itself. Karbauskis's characters love life. And they find it.
RG, December 1, 2005
Alena Karas
Children's games with death
Mindaugas Karbauskis dramatized "The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men"
A young and very successful student of Pyotr Fomenko, “appointed” by Oleg Tabakov to play the role of the most serious heir to the Moscow Art Theater traditions, Mindaugas Karbauskis has for some time now specialized exclusively in themes and images of death. So it was written and said about him more than once, fortunately there were reasons: “Old World Landowners”, “The Long Christmas Lunch”, “When I Was Dying” were built around these plots in one way or another.
Of course, death is a thing that is burdensome for the consciousness of a sensitive person and quite worthy of comprehension. But it’s not what Karbauskis is studying. He is fascinated by what is on its borders, he is haunted by the mystery of transitions, penetrations, and, ultimately, by the mystery of reconciliation. The cold, somewhat dry, transparent clarity of his works creates a strange flickering, mutual penetration of two worlds. This zone of intersections pulsates in him not with abstract philosophizing, but with a sensual, almost intimate joy of recognition. “Here” is inverted and reflected in “there”.
Of course, such desperate devotion to one plot evokes, in addition to respect, a slight chuckle from a critic always ready for irony. And then - a wonderful somersault: Karbauskis, as if directly counting on this laugh, arranges another attraction with death. Seven future hanged people, seven sentenced to death, frolicking like children, rolling down the slide on their bellies - straight into a snowdrift, into the sea, into death. The sound of the wave and the hot musical splash of Giedrius Puskinigis are picked up by their young bodies, and again - the descent, and again - the joyful splash of the wave.
The slide is a smooth, even stage plank, beveled towards the ramp at a strong angle (artist Maria Mitrofanova). At the corner of it was a large bed with blankets and pillows, from which terrorist boys and girls would prepare their mortal clothes. Vasily Kashirin (Aleksey Usoltsev), putting a blanket around his neck like a huge fur collar, moves towards the gallows, protecting his neck from the rope and himself from the mortal cold. And young Tanya Kovalchuk (Natalia Kosteneva) wraps her palms in a pillow like a muff. Each of them, on the night before death, hides their fears, their horror in this bed. Gradually, several bodies accumulate in it at once, still full of life, but for some reason it seems that this is already a mass grave, covered with snow.
In general, Karbauskis's direction is full of such powerful visual solutions, images that do not leave consciousness for a long time.
According to the tradition of the school, the lessons of Fomenko and Zhenovach, Karbauskis knows how to work with prose. In his “The Seven Hanged Men,” every soul is counted against each other, each of the “hanged men” is a detailed human history, rarely given to modern theater. And in the eyes of little Musya (Yana Sexte), who knows that there is no death, and goes to die with the cheerful and desperate Tsyganok (Dmitry Kulichkov), wise and knowing what death is in life itself, and therefore reconciled with it, Werner (Alexey Komashko ), the murderer Jansen (Alexander Vorobyov), tenderly taken by him “as a couple” on the road to the gallows, athletic, cheerful Sergei Golovin (Alexander Skotnikov), mourned by his parents with incredible, almost tragic force.
So it turned out for Karbauskis that Leonid Andreev, so gloomy and frightening, turned out to be completely gentle, almost sentimental. And whether you want it or not, your heart will beat with compassion. But Karbauskis’ story is not driven by sentimental force. He is based on a deep and subtle comprehension of life itself, permeated through and through with mortal shadows.
Children, cheerfully, desperately and carefreely sliding down a slide on their bellies straight into death - this is the final and main image of the performance. Talented and wonderful.
Culture, December 1, 2005
Svetlana Khokhryakova
He's scary, but we're not scared
"The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men." Version by Mindaugas Karbauskis
The premiere of the play based on “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” by Leonid Andreev took place at the Theater under the direction of Oleg Tabakov. The stage version of the same name is just over an hour long and is by Mindaugas Karbauskis. The choice, needless to say, is unexpected. Although theaters in the vast expanses of our vast country, no, no, and even turn to the marvelous, but so difficult for the stage, Andreev’s prose.
The story, as you know, was written in 1908, when the word “terrorism” was familiar to Russia firsthand. And it is dedicated to Leo Tolstoy, who spoke about Andreev like this: he scares, but I’m not afraid. M. Karbauskis, on purpose or by accident, by inspiration and creative inspiration, not only develops this idea, but elevates it to an absolute, although he does not intend to frighten anyone.
It’s probably stupid to put Andreev in the clear, so the director led his small creative team, consisting of eight actors - Alexander Vorobyov, Dmitry Kulichkov, Alexander Skotnikov, Alexey Komashko, Alexey Usoltsev, Yana Sekste, Daria Kalmykova and Pavel Ilyin, relatively speaking, according to the path of educational theater, when there are few staging possibilities, but there is a lot of imagination and thirst for acting. The hanged people don’t seem to be real hanged people, they seem to be playing a given game. They don’t portray potential hanged men, but look at them from the outside. No naturalism, strain or truth of feelings. A solid play structure, but not at all the same as that of Kirill Serebrennikov, who staged “Terrorism” on the stage of the then Moscow Art Theater. There is nothing on the edge here, rather gentle and transparent. The heroes change theatrical masks, turn from young ladies and boys into their parents, easily switching to age roles. They do it funny and youthfully touching, some are simply talented. Well, you really shouldn’t cry when visiting your stage son, who is facing death tomorrow. Moreover, the original source is not at all conducive to this.
The decoration is a tablet raised on end, with letters projected onto it, forming lines that are impossible to read; coats and overcoats hanging in the background on a hanger in a row. Before our eyes, they find a place on someone’s shoulders, and then return to their original place. The structure, which becomes the partitions of the cell and the possible gallows, is all a laconic and very functional space, well used in the game structure thanks to the production designer Maria Mitrofanova.
The topic of terrorism today is special and even attractive. K. Shakhnazarov not so long ago made the film “A Horseman Named Death”, being impressed not only by the present day, but also by the works of the terrorist B. Savinkov - the result was phantasmagoric feasts with a cancan, terrorism in theatrical masks. Imagining what M. Karbauskis is based on his performances and statements, I dare to suggest that he was least motivated to choose a topic by the topic of the day. Karbauskis thinks more globally. I would even suggest that the dance of death was much more interesting to him than the real threat of terrorism. A person facing a choice whether he is on the verge of death or something else, very important, is a topic that can illuminate more than just the immediacy of the day. Although Andreev’s phrases spoken from the stage about the fact that it is probably pointless to drink coffee, put on a fur coat, when in a few moments all this - the fur coat, the body, and the coffee - will be destroyed by an explosion, sink into the mind.
Results, December 5, 2005
Marina Zayonts
memento Mori
"The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men" at the Tabakerka Theater
Everyone wrote a long time ago that the theme of death for director Mindaugas Karbauskis is one of the main ones. That is how it is, and there is nothing to argue about. Suffice it to recall his “Old World Landowners” in the Moscow Art Theater. Chekhov, "The Long Christmas Lunch" and "When I Lay Dying" in "Snuffbox". And yet it seems that the director needs the fatal, repeated approach of death to the characters every time in order to talk about life. And he needed the gloomy, excessively pathetic story of Leonid Andreev precisely for this. The play “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” is not about how five terrorists and two criminals are awaiting the death penalty; it is far from being directly relevant, although the words about a belt with explosives, which the young conspirators tried on themselves to blow up the minister they disliked (Pavel Ilyin) , naturally, cause a quick reaction in the hall. Karbauskis staged, perhaps, his largest and most significant performance about how carelessly people live on earth (young revolutionaries, criminals, ministers, secret police and, in essence, each of us), who do not know how to appreciate what has been given to them from above.
In their minds, life is worth three kopecks, they don’t like the minister, he did something wrong, and we’ll blow him up once. Yes, we ourselves will die, well, then, let’s accept a heroic death, a young terrorist girl nicknamed Musya (Yana Sexte) joyfully exclaims. Or the slow Estonian peasant Janson (Alexander Vorobyov) killed his owner, I don’t understand why, it just happened. And so on until she (death, that is) stands next to you, that’s when it suddenly becomes scary. How scared the rescued minister felt: waking up alive and well, he clearly imagined how he left the house at the time appointed by the conspirators, how the bomb exploded, and that was the end of it all forever. What can we say about others sentenced to execution, here even the cocky robber and murderer Tsyganok (Dmitry Kulichkov) will feel something before he jumps with everyone else into the black abyss. Karbauskis focused our attention on these moments that pierce a person, and then suddenly abruptly switches the darkness to bright light, so that everyone can see how wonderful and fun it is to slide down a slide on a frosty sunny day and how great it is when young people laugh from excess strength and fool around . From the sloping, raised platform (set designer Maria Mitrofanova), young guys roll belly down, laughing and screaming, leaving seven of their greatcoats hanging in a row on a hanger at the back of the stage.
Karbauskis, as it turns out, doesn’t avoid the fashionable crowd for nothing, sticks to himself like a biryuk, and goes out on his own. He does not work on the fly, he seriously masters the profession - the result, as they say, is obvious. And like none of the noisily promoted new directors, he works skillfully and accurately with actors. For the most part, very young, not captured by television, the actors of “Snuffbox” play here with a concentration and strength that is rare today - Dmitry Kulichkov, Alexander Skotnikov (Sergei Golovin), Alexey Komashko (Werner), Daria Kalmykova (Tanya Kovalchuk), and everyone else. It’s at performances like these that you understand that no, citizens, it’s not all over for Russian psychological theater. Its renewal is just beginning, one might say, before our eyes.
House of Actors, No. 1, 2006
Alla Shenderova
Mercy for the Fallen
Mindaugas Karbauskis, a student of Pyotr Fomenko, an imperturbable Lithuanian, reflecting on life after death from production to production, staged his most passionate and life-affirming performance - “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men” at the Studio Theater under the direction of Oleg Tabakov.
Leonid Andreev dedicated his story to Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy. “Seven death sentences: two in Taganrog, one in Moscow, two in Penza, two in Riga... They write and talk about executions, hangings, murders, bombs now, as they used to talk about the weather” - Tolstoy’s article “I Can’t Be Silent” was written in May 1908, a few months before The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men.
Karbauskis staged it as if “I Can’t Be Silent” was written today. He boldly stepped into the field of journalism trampled and scorched by the Soviet theater, but there are no direct appeals to the audience, no open appeals in the performance.
The entire right half of the small stage of the “Snuffbox” reared up, as if the five terrorists - the heroes of the story - had finally managed to detonate their bomb. Once upon a time, in the 60s, “Pugachev” was played on a similar sloping platform at the Taganka Theater. The platform predicted the end of the rebellion - it ended with a scaffold with axes. Here, in the scenery of Maria Mitrofanova, it easily becomes an ice slide, from which those who will then have to go to the gallows merrily slide down. And before the action begins, the text of Andreev’s story is displayed on a dark platform. When the lights go out in the hall, the sloping platform looks like a convex globe dotted with luminous points.
However, from the first seconds of the performance the pathos is deliberately reduced. The story begins casually and not without humor. In the depths, behind the platform, there is an ordinary hanger. Young people run in from the cold, cheerfully undress and leave. There are seven coats left on the rack.
The director did not turn Andreev's story into a play. The actors move from direct speech to indirect speech with masterly ease and instantly change roles. You are surprised at their skill, and then you understand: from hero to storyteller, from executioner to victim - one step.
Andreev's story begins with the police preventing the murder of the minister and arresting the conspirators. Having happily escaped death, the minister suffers from insomnia and calls his servants. In Karbauskis, the same people who will later be sentenced to the gallows appear as silent and obedient servants. And this is not just another juggling of roles, but an almost literal embodiment of Tolstoy’s phrase: you hang those who serve you.
Without at all travestying the situation, Karbauskis notices the comedy and absurdity in the hopeless tragedy. The situation itself is absurd: young, healthy, full of life people are languishing in anticipation of death. The most intolerable moment of the story - the last meeting of the terrorists with their relatives - is reproduced almost verbatim. Sergei Golovin’s mother and father come to see him - a retired colonel, who spent the whole night thinking about how not to aggravate his son’s last moments. In addition to the dignity and authenticity of this scene (the parents are played by the same Daria Kalmykova and Alexey Komashko, who will appear in the roles of terrorists a moment later), its terrible comedy is revealed: in order to touch her son once again, the mother comes up with an endless series of acquaintances who supposedly told him to hug him. And again and again she throws herself on his neck.
The convention in which actors talk about their characters in the third person is combined with the absolute psychological authenticity of the game. Terrorist Sergei Golovin (Alexander Skotnikov) is doing exercises while awaiting execution. Having taken off his shirt, the actor does an exercise and recites the text from the author, and we freeze, imagining how this naked torso will twitch in the last convulsions... A restless girl with ridiculous pigtails, referred to in the play only as “terrorist Musya” (Yana Sexte), suddenly turns into a stupid woman - the mother of terrorist Vasily Kashirin. And it is unbearable to watch how the meaning of her son’s last phrase reaches her dark consciousness: “They will hang me”...
A spark of absurdity and surprise is struck at every collision of life and death. In the story, in addition to the five young terrorists, two robbers are hanged. A stupid Estonian peasant who stabbed his owner (Alexander Vorobyov) considers the death sentence a jailer’s joke and begins to laugh boisterously, and the dashing murderer Tsyganok (Dmitry Kulichkov) suddenly shows nobility and rejects the life offered in exchange for the position of executioner.
The director does not judge anyone, but does not justify anyone. Following Andreev and Tolstoy, he speaks of the criminal absurdity of the institution of the death penalty. And about dignity - the only thing that resists death.
When Andreev's text describing the dead bodies of those strangled has finished, the director will show us his ending. Seven convicts will rise to the upper edge of the platform and jump down somewhere to the sound of the Baltic waves - they will go not into death, but into eternity. The minister, who was saved at the cost of their lives and who spent almost the entire action silently looking into the hall, will have his eyes closed. The one who truly dies is the one who sent others, even criminals, to their deaths.
Oddly enough, the performance turned out to be life-affirming. Not only because after a pause the minister will open his eyes, and the seven hanged men will again appear in the role of his humble servants - life will return to normal. By the very fact of its existence, this almost impeccably made performance convinces: today again, without travesty, parody and anything else, you can stage Andreev, share Tolstoy’s thoughts and show Pushkin’s “mercy for the fallen.” So it's not over yet?! We'll live a little longer.
