Excerpt from One Hundred Years of Solitude

“Don’t, Fields, take them,” Natasha said.
In the middle of the conversation in the couch, Dimmler entered the room and walked over to the harp in the corner. He took off the cloth, and the harp made a false sound.
- Eduard Karlich, please play my beloved Nocturiene Monsieur Field, - said the voice of the old countess from the living room.
Dimmler took a chord and, turning to Natasha, Nikolai and Sonya, said: - Youth, how quietly they sit!
- Yes, we are philosophizing, - said Natasha, looking around for a minute, and continued the conversation. The conversation was now about dreams.
Dimmler started playing. Natasha quietly, on tiptoe, went up to the table, took the candle, carried it out and, returning, quietly sat down in her place. It was dark in the room, especially on the sofa on which they were sitting, but through the large windows the silver light of a full moon fell on the floor.
- You know, I think, - Natasha said in a whisper, moving closer to Nikolai and Sonya, when Dimmler had already finished and was sitting, weakly playing the strings, apparently hesitating to leave, or to start something new, - that when you remember that, you remember, you remember everything , you remember so much that you remember what happened before I was in the world ...
“This is metampsikova,” said Sonya, who always studied well and remembered everything. - The Egyptians believed that our souls were in animals and will again go to animals.
“No, you know, I don’t believe it, so that we were in animals,” Natasha said in the same whisper, although the music ended, “but I know for certain that we were angels somewhere and here we were, and from this we remember everything ...
- May I join you? - said Dimmler, who quietly approached and sat down next to them.
- If we were angels, why did we get lower? - said Nikolay. - No, it can't be!
“Not lower, who told you that lower?… Why do I know what I was before,” Natasha objected with conviction. - After all, the soul is immortal ... therefore, if I live forever, this is how I lived before, lived for an eternity.
“Yes, but it's hard for us to imagine eternity,” said Dimmler, who approached the young people with a mild contemptuous smile, but now spoke as quietly and seriously as they did.
- Why is it difficult to imagine eternity? - said Natasha. - Today it will be, tomorrow it will be, it will always be, and it was yesterday and the day before it was ...
- Natasha! now it's your turn. Sing me something, - the countess's voice was heard. - That you sat down like conspirators.
- Mama! I don’t want to, ”Natasha said, but at the same time she got up.
All of them, even the middle-aged Dimmler, did not want to interrupt the conversation and leave the corner of the sofa, but Natasha got up, and Nikolai sat down at the clavichord. As always, standing in the middle of the hall and choosing the most advantageous place for the resonance, Natasha began to sing her mother's favorite piece.
She said that she did not want to sing, but she did not sing for a long time before, and for a long time after, as she sang that evening. Count Ilya Andreich from the office where he talked with Mitinka, heard her singing, and like a student in a hurry to go to play, finishing the lesson, he got confused in words, giving orders to the manager and finally fell silent, and Mitinka, also listening, silently with a smile, stood in front of graph. Nikolai did not take his eyes off his sister, and took his breath with her. Sonia, listening, thought about what a huge difference there was between her and her friend and how impossible it was for her to be in any way as charming as her cousin. The old countess sat with a happily sad smile and tears in her eyes, occasionally shaking her head. She thought about Natasha, and about her youth, and about how something unnatural and terrible is in this upcoming marriage of Natasha with Prince Andrey.
Dimmler sat down next to the Countess and closed his eyes, listening.
“No, Countess,” he said at last, “this is a European talent, she has nothing to learn, this softness, tenderness, strength ...
- Ah! how afraid I am for her, how afraid I am, ”said the Countess, not remembering who she was talking to. Her maternal instinct told her that something was too much in Natasha, and that she would not be happy about it. Natasha had not yet finished singing when an enthusiastic fourteen-year-old Petya ran into the room with the news that the mummers had arrived.
Natasha suddenly stopped.
- Fool! - She shouted at her brother, ran to the chair, fell on him and sobbed so that for a long time then she could not stop.
“Nothing, mamma, really nothing, so: Petya frightened me,” she said, trying to smile, but her tears kept flowing and sobs squeezed her throat.
Dressed up courtyards, bears, Turks, innkeepers, ladies, terrible and funny, bringing with them coldness and gaiety, at first shyly huddled in the hall; then, hiding one behind the other, they were forced out into the hall; and at first shyly, and then more and more merrily and more amicably songs, dances, choral and Christmas-time games began. The Countess, recognizing the faces and laughing at the dressed up, went into the living room. Count Ilya Andreevich was sitting in the hall with a beaming smile, approving of the players. The youth disappeared somewhere.
Half an hour later, in the hall between the other mummers, an old lady in tansas appeared - it was Nikolai. Petya was a Turkish woman. Payas - it was Dimmler, the hussar - Natasha and the Circassian - Sonya, with a painted cork mustache and eyebrows.
After condescending surprise, unrecognition and praise from those who were not dressed up, the young people found that the costumes were so good that they had to be shown to someone else.
Nikolai, who wanted to drive everyone along an excellent road in his troika, suggested taking with him ten dressed-up men from the courtyards to go to his uncle.
- No, why are you upsetting him, the old man! - said the countess, - and he has nowhere to turn. Already go, so to the Melyukovs.
Melyukova was a widow with children of various ages, also with governesses and governors, who lived four miles from the Rostovs.
- Here, ma chere, cleverly, - the old count, stirring up, picked up. - Let's dress up now and go with you. I'll stir up Pasheta.
But the countess did not agree to let the count go: his leg ached all these days. They decided that Ilya Andreevich was not allowed to go, and that if Louise Ivanovna (m me Schoss) went, then the young ladies could go to Melukova's. Sonya, always timid and shy, most urgently began to beg Louise Ivanovna not to refuse them.
Sonya's outfit was the best. Her mustache and eyebrows went extraordinarily towards her. Everyone told her that she was very good, and she was in a lively energetic mood unusual for her. What is inner voice told her that now or never her fate would be decided, and in her man's dress she seemed a completely different person. Louise Ivanovna agreed, and half an hour later four troikas with bells and bells, screeching and whistling undercuts through the frosty snow, drove up to the porch.
Natasha was the first to give the tone of Christmas fun, and this fun, reflecting from one to another, intensified more and more and came to the highest degree at the time when everyone went out into the cold, and talking, calling, laughing and shouting, sat down in the sleigh.
Two triplets were accelerating, the third was an old count's troika with an Oryol trotter at the root; Nicholas' fourth own with his short, black, shaggy root. Nicholas, in his old lady's attire, on which he put on a hussar, belted cloak, stood in the middle of his sleigh, picking up the reins.
It was so bright that he saw the plaques gleaming in the monthly light and the eyes of the horses, looking fearfully at the riders rustling under the dark canopy of the entrance.
Natasha, Sonya, m me Schoss and two girls sat in Nikolay's sleigh. In the sleigh of the old count sat Dimmler with his wife and Petya; the rest were filled with dressed-up courtyards.
- Let's go ahead, Zakhar! - Nikolay shouted to the coachman of his father, in order to have a chance to overtake him on the road.
The three of the old count, in which Dimmler and other mummers sat, screeching with runners, as if freezing to the snow, and jingling with a thick bell, moved forward. The guards huddled on the shafts and got stuck, turning hard and shiny snow like sugar.
Nikolai started after the first three; the others rustled and screamed from behind. At first we rode at a small trot along a narrow road. As we drove past the garden, the shadows from the bare trees often lay across the road and hid bright light moons, but as soon as they drove beyond the fence, a diamond-shining, with a bluish gleam, a snowy plain, all bathed in monthly radiance and motionless, opened on all sides. Once, once, he pushed a bump in the front sleigh; the next sleigh pushed in the same way, and the next, and, boldly breaking the chained silence, one after another the sleigh began to stretch out.
- Trail of a hare, many tracks! - Natasha's voice sounded in the frosty, constrained air.
- Apparently, Nicolas! - said the voice of Sonya. - Nikolay looked back at Sonya and bent down to take a closer look at her face. Something completely new, sweet, face, with black eyebrows and mustache, in the moonlight, near and far, peeked out of the sables.
“That was Sonya before,” thought Nikolai. He looked at her closer and smiled.
- What are you, Nicolas?
“Nothing,” he said, and turned back to the horses.
Having driven out onto the torny, high road, oiled with runners and all cut by the traces of thorns visible in the light of the month, the horses began to pull the reins of their own accord and add speed. The left attachment, bending her head, twitched its strings in leaps and bounds. Root swayed, waving his ears, as if asking: "Should I start or is it too early?" - Ahead, already far apart and ringing a receding thick bell, Zakhar's black troika was clearly visible on the white snow. From his sleigh could be heard shouting and laughter and the voices of the dressed up.
- Well, you, dear ones, - Nikolay shouted, tugging on the reins on one side and withdrawing his hand with the whip. And only by the wind, which seemed to intensify in a head-on, and by the twitching of the fasteners, which were tightening and adding all the speed, it was noticeable how quickly the troika flew. Nikolai looked back. With shouts and squeals, waving whips and forcing the indigenous people to gallop, the other troikas kept up. The root staunchly swayed under the arc, not thinking to knock down and promising to add more and more when necessary.
Nikolai caught up with the top three. They drove down some mountain, drove onto a wide-traveled road through a meadow near the river.
"Where are we going?" thought Nikolay. - “There should be a slanting meadow. But no, this is something new that I have never seen. This is not a slanting meadow or Demkina Mountain, but God knows what it is! This is something new and magical. Well, whatever it is! " And he, shouting to the horses, began to go around the first three.
Zakhar restrained the horses and wrapped his face, which was already frosty to the eyebrows.
Nikolai let his horses go; Zakhar, stretching out his hands, smacked his lips and let his own people go.
“Well hold on, sir,” he said. - Threes flew nearby even faster, and the legs of galloping horses quickly changed. Nikolay began to pick up ahead. Zakhar, without changing the position of outstretched arms, raised one hand with the reins.
“You're lying, sir,” he shouted to Nikolai. Nikolay put all the horses into gallop and overtook Zakhar. The horses covered the faces of the riders with fine, dry snow, next to them there were frequent busting and fast-moving legs confused, and the shadows of the overtaken troika. The whistle of runners in the snow and women's screams were heard from different directions.
Stopping the horses again, Nikolai looked around him. All around was the same soaked through and through moonlight a magical plain with stars scattered over it.
“Zakhar shouts that I should take to the left; why left? thought Nikolai. Are we going to the Melyukovs, is this Melyukovka? We God knows where we are going, and God knows what is happening to us - and it is very strange and good what is happening to us. " He looked back at the sleigh.
“Look, he has both mustache and eyelashes, everything is white,” said one of the strange, pretty and strangers sitting there with thin mustaches and eyebrows.
“This one, it seems, was Natasha, Nikolay thought, and this one is m me Schoss; or maybe not, and this is a Circassian with a mustache, I don’t know who, but I love her. ”
- Aren't you cold? - he asked. They didn't answer and laughed. Dimmler was shouting something from the back of the sleigh, probably funny, but you couldn't hear what he was shouting.
- Yes, yes, - the voices answered laughing.
- However, here's some magical forest with iridescent black shadows and sparkles of diamonds and with some kind of enfilade of marble steps, and some kind of silver roofs of magical buildings, and the piercing squeal of some kind of animals. “And if it really is Melyukovka, then it is even stranger that we went, God knows where, and arrived at Melukovka,” Nikolai thought.
Indeed, it was Melyukovka, and girls and footmen ran into the entrance with candles and joyful faces.
- Who it? - asked from the entrance.
- Counts dressed up, I see the horses, - answered the voices.

Pelageya Danilovna Melukova, a broad, energetic woman, with glasses and a swing-open hood, was sitting in the living room, surrounded by her daughters, whom she tried not to let get bored. They quietly poured wax and looked at the shadows of the figures emerging, when footsteps and voices of visitors rustled in the hall.
Hussars, ladies, witches, payas, bears, clearing their throats and wiping their frosty faces in the hallway, entered the hall, where they hastily lit candles. The clown - Dimmler with the lady - Nikolai opened the dance. Surrounded by screaming children, the mummers, covering their faces and changing their voices, bowed to the hostess and were placed around the room.
- Oh, you can't find out! But Natasha! Look what she looks like! Really, it reminds someone. Eduard then Karlych is so good! I didn't know. Yes, how she dances! Oh, priests, and some kind of Circassian; right, as it goes for Sonyushka. Who is this? Well, they consoled me! Take the tables, Nikita, Vanya. And we sat so quietly!
- Ha ha ha! ... Hussar then, hussar! Like a boy, and legs! ... I can't see ... - voices were heard.
Natasha, the favorite of the young Melyukovs, disappeared with them into the back rooms, where a cork was required and various robes and men's dresses, which through the open door received naked girls' hands from the footman. Ten minutes later, all the youth of the Melukov family joined the mummers.
Pelageya Danilovna, having ordered the cleaning of the place for guests and treats for gentlemen and courtyards, without taking off her glasses, with a restrained smile, walked between the mummers, looking closely into their faces and not recognizing anyone. She did not recognize not only the Rostovs and Dimmler, but also could not recognize either her daughters or those husband's robes and uniforms that were on them.
- Whose is this? - she said, turning to her governess and looking into the face of her daughter, who represented the Kazan Tatar. - It seems that someone is from the Rostovs. Well, you, mister hussar, in which regiment do you serve? She asked Natasha. “Give the Turk, give the Turk some marshmallows,” she said to the bartender who was carrying it, “this is not prohibited by their law.
Sometimes, looking at the strange but funny steps that the dancers performed, who decided once and for all that they were dressed up, that no one would recognize them, and therefore were not embarrassed, Pelageya Danilovna covered herself with a handkerchief, and her whole fat body shook with irrepressible kind, old woman laughter ... - Sashinet is mine, Sashinet is mine! She said.
After Russian dances and round dances, Pelageya Danilovna united all the servants and gentlemen together, into one big circle; they brought a ring, a string and a ruble, and the general games were arranged.
An hour later, all the suits were crumpled and upset. Cork mustache and eyebrows were smeared over sweaty, flushed, and cheerful faces. Pelageya Danilovna began to recognize the mummers, admired how well the costumes were made, how they went especially to the young ladies, and thanked everyone for making her so amused. The guests were invited to have supper in the drawing-room, and the courtyard's food was ordered in the hall.
- No, guessing in the bathhouse, that's scary! - the old girl who lived with the Melyukovs said at supper.
- From what? - asked eldest daughter Melukovs.
- Don't go, you need courage ...
“I'll go,” said Sonya.
- Tell us how it was with the young lady? - said the second Melukova.
- Yes, just like that, one young lady went, - said the old girl, - she took a rooster, two instruments - she sat down properly. She sat there, only hears, suddenly she is going ... a sleigh drove up with bells, bells; hears, goes. She enters completely in the form of a human, as an officer is, came and sat down with her at the device.
- A! Ah! ... - Natasha shouted, rolling her eyes in horror.
- Why, he says so?
- Yes, as a man, everything is as it should be, and began, and began to persuade, and she should have kept him talking until the cocks; and she grew stiff; - just grew stiff and covered herself with her hands. He picked her up. It's good that the girls came running here ...
- Well, why scare them! - said Pelageya Danilovna.
- Mother, you yourself were guessing ... - said the daughter.
- And how is it in the barn guessing? - asked Sonya.
- Yes, if only now, they will go to the barn, and they will listen. What you will hear: hammering, knocking - bad, and pouring bread - this is good; otherwise it happens ...
- Mom, tell us what happened to you in the barn?
Pelageya Danilovna smiled.
- Yes, I already forgot ... - she said. “You’re not coming, are you?”
- No, I'll go; Pepageya Danilovna, let me go, I'll go, ”said Sonya.
- Well, if you're not afraid.
- Louise Ivanovna, can I? - asked Sonya.
Whether they played with a ring, a string or a ruble, whether they talked, as now, Nikolai did not leave Sonya and looked at her with completely new eyes. It seemed to him that today only for the first time, thanks to those cork mustache, he fully recognized her. Sonya really was cheerful, lively and good that evening, such as Nikolai had never seen her before.
"So this is what she is, but I'm a fool!" he thought, looking at her sparkling eyes and a happy, enthusiastic smile that dimpled her cheeks from under her mustache, which he had not seen before.
“I'm not afraid of anything,” said Sonya. - Can I now? - She got up. Sonya was told where the barn was, how to stand and listen in silence, and they gave her a fur coat. She threw it over her head and looked at Nikolai.
"What a lovely girl this is!" he thought. "And what have I been thinking up to now!"
Sonya went out into the corridor to go to the barn. Nikolai hurriedly went to the front porch, saying that he was hot. Indeed, the house was stuffy from the crowded people.
The yard was the same motionless cold, the same month, only it was even brighter. The light was so strong and there were so many stars in the snow that I did not want to look at the sky, and the real stars were invisible. The sky was black and boring, the earth was fun.
"I am a fool, a fool! What have you been waiting for so far? " thought Nikolai, and, running to the porch, he walked around the corner of the house along the path that led to the back porch. He knew that Sonya would go here. In the middle of the road there were stacked fathoms of firewood, there was snow on them, a shadow was falling from them; through them and from their sides, intertwining, the shadows of old bare lindens fell on the snow and the path. The path led to the barn. The chopped wall of the barn and the roof, covered with snow, as if hewn from some precious stone, glittered in the monthly light. A tree cracked in the garden, and again everything was completely quiet. The chest, it seemed, did not breathe air, but some kind of eternally youthful strength and joy.
From the girl's porch, feet knocked on the steps, there was a loud sound on the last one, on which snow was applied, and the voice of the old girl said:
- Straight, straight, along the path, young lady. Just don't look back.
- I'm not afraid, - Sonya's voice answered, and along the path, towards Nikolai, Sonya's legs squealed, whistled in thin shoes.
Sonya walked wrapped in a fur coat. She was already two steps away when she saw him; she saw him, too, not the way she knew and which she had always been a little afraid of. He was in a woman's dress with matted hair and a smile that was happy and new for Sonya. Sonya quickly ran up to him.
"Quite different, and still the same," thought Nikolai, looking at her face, all lit by the moonlight. He put his hands under the fur coat that covered her head, hugged her, pressed her to him and kissed her lips, over which there was a mustache and which smelled of burnt cork. Sonya kissed him in the very middle of her lips and, straightening her small hands, took him by the cheeks on both sides.
“Sonya!… Nicolas!…” They just said. They ran to the barn and each came back from their own porch.

When everyone drove back from Pelageya Danilovna, Natasha, who always saw and noticed everything, arranged the accommodation so that Louise Ivanovna and she sat in the sleigh with Dimmler, and Sonya sat with Nikolai and the girls.
Nicholas, no longer overtaking, rode straight on his way back, and all the while peering into this strange moonlight at Sonya, in this all-changing light, from under his eyebrows and mustache his old and present Sonya, with whom he had never decided part. He peered, and when he recognized the same and the other and recalled, hearing this smell of cork, mixed with the feeling of a kiss, he breathed in the frosty air deeply and, looking at the leaving earth and the shining sky, he felt himself again in a magical kingdom.
- Sonya, are you okay? He asked occasionally.
- Yes, - Sonya answered. - And you?
In the middle of the road Nikolai let the coachman hold the horses, ran to Natasha's sleigh for a moment and stood on the bend.
“Natasha,” he said to her in a whisper in French, “you know, I’ve made up my mind about Sonya.
- Did you tell her? - asked Natasha, all suddenly beaming with joy.
- Oh, how strange you are with that mustache and eyebrows, Natasha! Are you happy?
- I'm so glad, so glad! I was really angry with you. I didn't tell you, but you did wrong to her. This is such a heart, Nicolas. I'm so glad! I can be nasty, but I was ashamed to be alone happy without Sonya, - Natasha continued. - Now I'm so glad, well, run to her.
- No, wait, oh, how funny you are! - said Nikolai, still peering at her, and in his sister, too, finding something new, unusual and charmingly tender, which he had not seen in her before. - Natasha, something magical. A?
“Yes,” she replied, “you did a great job.
"If I had seen her as she is now," thought Nikolai, "I would have long ago asked what to do and would have done everything, no matter what she ordered, and everything would be fine."
- So you're glad and I did well?
- Oh, so good! I recently had a fight with my mother about it. Mom said she was catching you. How can you say this? I almost scolded my mother. And I will never allow anyone to say or think anything bad about her, because there is one good thing in her.
- So good? - said Nikolay, once again looking out for the expression on his sister's face to find out if this was true, and, hiding with his boots, he jumped off the bend and ran to his sleigh. The same happy, smiling Circassian, with a mustache and shining eyes, looking out from under a sable hood, sat there, and this Circassian was Sonya, and this Sonya was probably his future, happy and loving wife.
Arriving home and telling their mother about how they spent time with the Melyukovs, the young ladies went to their place. Having undressed, but not erasing their cork mustache, they sat for a long time, talking about their happiness. They talked about how they would be married, how their husbands would be friendly and how happy they would be.
On Natasha's table there were mirrors prepared by Dunyasha since the evening. - Only when will all this be? I am afraid that never ... That would be too good! - said Natasha getting up and going to the mirrors.
“Sit down, Natasha, maybe you’ll see him,” said Sonya. Natasha lit candles and sat down. “I see someone with a mustache,” said Natasha, who had seen her face.
“Don't laugh, young lady,” said Dunyasha.
Natasha, with the help of Sonya and the maid, found a position for the mirror; her face assumed a serious expression, and she fell silent. For a long time she sat, looking at the row of outgoing candles in the mirrors, assuming (considering the stories she heard) that she would see the coffin, that she would see him, Prince Andrew, in this last, merging, vague square. But no matter how ready she was to take the slightest stain for the image of a person or a coffin, she did not see anything. She blinked frequently and moved away from the mirror.
- Why do others see, but I do not see anything? - she said. - Well, sit down, Sonya; today you absolutely must, ”she said. - Only for me ... I'm so scared today!
Sonya sat down at the mirror, arranged a position, and began to look.
“They will certainly see Sofya Alexandrovna,” said Dunyasha in a whisper; - and you are all laughing.
Sonya heard these words, and heard Natasha say in a whisper:
- And I know what she will see; she saw last year.
For three minutes everyone was silent. "Certainly!" whispered Natasha and did not finish ... Suddenly Sonya pushed aside the mirror she was holding and covered her eyes with her hand.
- Ah, Natasha! - she said.
- Did you? Have you seen? What did you see? - Natasha screamed, supporting the mirror.
Sonya did not see anything, she just wanted to blink her eyes and get up when she heard Natasha's voice, who said "certainly" ... She did not want to deceive either Dunyasha or Natasha, and it was hard to sit. She herself did not know how and as a result of which a cry escaped from her when she closed her eyes with her hand.
- Did you see him? Natasha asked, grabbing her hand.
- Yes. Wait ... I ... saw him, - Sonya involuntarily said, not yet knowing who Natasha meant by his word: him - Nikolai or him - Andrey.
“But why shouldn't I say what I saw? After all, others see! And who can convict me of what I saw or did not see? " flashed in Sonya's head.
“Yes, I saw him,” she said.
- How? How is it? Is it standing or lying?
- No, I saw ... That was nothing, suddenly I see that he is lying.
- Is Andrey lying? He is sick? - Natasha asked with frightened fixed eyes looking at her friend.
“No, on the contrary,” on the contrary, a cheerful face, and he turned to me, “and the minute she spoke, it seemed to her herself that she saw what she was saying.
- Well, then, Sonya? ...
- Here I did not consider that something blue and red ...
- Sonya! when will he return? When I see him! My God, how I am afraid for him and for myself, and for everything I am afraid ... - Natasha spoke, and without answering a word to Sonya's consolations, she went to bed and long after they had extinguished the candle, with open eyes, lay motionless on the bed and looked at the frosty, Moonlight through the frozen windows.

Soon after Christmastide, Nikolai announced to his mother his love for Sonya and his firm decision to marry her. The Countess, who had noticed for a long time what was happening between Sonya and Nikolai, and was expecting this explanation, silently listened to his words and told her son that he could marry whoever he wanted; but that neither she nor his father would give him the blessing for such a marriage. For the first time, Nikolai felt that his mother was unhappy with him, that despite all her love for him, she would not yield to him. She, coldly and not looking at her son, sent for her husband; and when he arrived, the countess wanted to briefly and coldly tell him what the matter was in the presence of Nicholas, but could not resist: she wept with tears of annoyance and left the room. The old count began to hesitantly advise Nicholas and ask him to abandon his intention. Nikolai replied that he could not change his word, and the father, sighing and obviously embarrassed, very soon interrupted his speech and went to the countess. In all the clashes with his son, the count did not leave the consciousness of his guilt in front of him for the upsetting of affairs, and therefore he could not be angry with his son for refusing to marry a rich bride and for choosing a dowry Sonya - he only remembered more vividly on this occasion that, if things were not upset, it was impossible for Nicholas to wish best wife than Sonya; and that he is the only one guilty of upsetting affairs with his Mitenka and with his irresistible habits.
The father and mother no longer talked about this matter with their son; but a few days after that, the countess called Sonya to her, and with a cruelty that neither one nor the other expected, the countess reproached her niece for enticing her son and for being ungrateful. Sonya, silently with lowered eyes, listened to the countess's cruel words and did not understand what was demanded of her. She was ready to sacrifice everything for her benefactors. The thought of self-sacrifice was her favorite thought; but in this case she could not understand to whom and what she should sacrifice. She could not help but love the Countess and the entire Rostov family, but she could not help but love Nikolai and not know that his happiness depended on this love. She was silent and sad, and did not answer. Nikolai, as it seemed to him, could not bear more than this situation and went to explain himself to his mother. Nikolay either begged his mother to forgive him and Sonya and agree to their marriage, then he threatened his mother that if Sonya were persecuted, he would immediately marry her in secret.
The countess, with a coldness that her son had never seen, answered him that he was an adult, that Prince Andrew would marry without the consent of his father, and that he could do the same, but that she would never recognize this intriguer as her daughter.
Exploded by the word intriguant, Nikolai, raising his voice, told his mother that he never thought that she would force him to sell his feelings, and that if this was so, then he last time says ... But he did not have time to say that decisive word, which, judging by the expression on his face, his mother was waiting with horror, and which, perhaps, would forever remain a cruel memory between them. He did not have time to finish, because Natasha, with a pale and serious face, entered the room from the door at which she was eavesdropping.
- Nikolinka, you are talking nonsense, shut up, shut up! I tell you, shut up! .. - she almost shouted to drown out his voice.
“Mom, darling, this is not at all because ... my darling, poor,” she turned to her mother, who, feeling herself on the verge of a break, looked at her son with horror, but, due to stubbornness and enthusiasm for the struggle, did not want and could not give up.
“Nikolinka, I’ll explain it to you, you go away - you listen, my dear mother,” she said to her mother.
Her words were meaningless; but they achieved the result she was aiming for.
The countess hid her face heavily on her daughter's chest, and Nikolai got up, grabbed his head and left the room.
Natasha took up the matter of reconciliation and brought him to the point that Nikolai received a promise from his mother that Sonya would not be oppressed, and he himself made a promise that he would not do anything secretly from his parents.
With the firm intention, having arranged his affairs in the regiment, retire, come and marry Sonya, Nikolai, sad and serious, at odds with his family, but, as it seemed to him, passionately in love, left for the regiment at the beginning of January.
After Nikolai's departure, the Rostovs' house became sadder than ever. The Countess became ill from mental disorder.
Sonya was sad both from the separation from Nikolai and even more from that hostile tone with which the Countess could not help treating her. The count was more than ever concerned about the bad state of affairs, which required some sort of decisive action. It was necessary to sell a Moscow house and a house near Moscow, and to sell a house it was necessary to go to Moscow. But the countess's health forced her to postpone her departure from day to day.

Phew, I finally finished reading the book of Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez "100 Years of Solitude" ( Cien años de soledad), written by him in 1967. Usually, after having read this or that work, I try to arrange my thoughts about what I have read in several lines. Sometimes such spontaneous reviews appear on the blog, sometimes in a contact on the wall. I try not to disclose the content of the book, so that it will be more interesting for you to read if you are thinking. Before writing anything about the book, let me tell you about the author himself.

Marquez - amazing person... His biography somehow reminded me of the biography of Ernest Hemingway. Gabriel García Márquez was the winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, was a mediator in the negotiations between Clinton and Fidel Castro, saw Paris but did not die, drove through the USSR and was amazed by the lack of advertising for Coca-Cola ... In a word, it will be interesting, read it yourself.

What can you say about the "Hundred Years"?

I did it! Several years ago, when I started reading this work, I put it aside for later. There were two reasons - boredom and confusion. Boredom - from the fact that the plot did not catch me in any way, confusion - from the fact that in the Buendía family, which is at the center of the story, it was customary to call children by the same names. During the reading of the book, I counted about 40 main characters, the names of which, as a rule, are similar and the only thing that saves the reader from the final confusion is that Marquez leads his story in chronological order.

This time, when I attacked Marquez, I used a paper-and-pen tactic, recording all of them from the very beginning. actors on paper, and connecting them with arrows. This simple technique allowed me not to go crazy and to reach the end of this, surprisingly, interesting book... As I understand it, the names were repeated for a reason, but this was one of the author's techniques, and at the end of the work the reader understands why this endless wheel of Samsara was spinning in this way.

From boredom to interest

Probably, I matured, since the book, this time, responded in me and I was able to read it to the end. The novel tells about the life of a single family over a hundred years. The book is about life and death, love and sex, war and peace, sweets and bitterness of being. Someone dies, someone is born - the run of time cannot be stopped. Someone goes to war to fight for their ideals, but comes to disappointment, someone wanders the world in search of love, but finds only whores.

People constantly do something, and as a result come to the collapse of hopes, realizing that life is a series of endless illusions. The novel begins quite fun and exciting, but ends in such a way that somewhere inside you begin to ache. Endless loneliness, damn it.

The most appropriate expression, in my opinion, describing this work is "a fairy tale for adults." A metaphysical patchwork colored blanket that lay on the stove and did not bother anyone until you began to examine it, and it turned out that the patches of which it consists are completely independent fragments that fold into a bizarre pattern.

Later I found out that the genre in which this book was written is called "magic realism", but I still could not find the words to describe what I read. It is believed that this novel is partly autobiographical. Perhaps this is so.

There are places in the book that will make you laugh. There are places that will make you sad or even gasp for injustice. There are passages, reading which you will regretfully understand that the book is about to end, but nothing is clear yet. There is also an ending that was somewhat predictable, but would not give us any answer, as if Marquez would like the reader to think a little about what he read.

If you are thinking of reading One Hundred Years of Solitude, just do it, and I hope you will understand why this novel is one of the central works. fiction 20th century. The book reads very vividly, the syllable is bright and dynamic, and the energy contained in the lines "100 years of solitude" will remind you of a Latin American carnival. What was the last book you read? Chirp in the comments to the article, I wonder what else you can read at your leisure. I would be glad to advice from my readers.

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April 17 passed away Gabriel García Márquez- a writer who became a classic during his lifetime. The novel "One Hundred Years of Solitude" brought worldwide fame to the writer - a book that was written in such an unusual manner that many publishers refused to publish it. Only one risk took - and the work became an international bestseller. On this moment more than 30 million copies of the book have been sold worldwide.

Gabriel Garcia Marxes. Photo: flickr.com / Carlos Botelho II

Background

Nobel laureate for literature and one of the most famous Colombian writers (if not the most famous), Gabriel García Márquez was born in 1927 in the small town of Aracataca. The boy spent his entire childhood with his grandparents (retired colonel), listening to folk legends and legends. Over the years, they will be reflected in his works, and the city itself will become the prototype of Macondo - the fictional place where the novel “One Hundred Years of Solitude” takes place. A few decades later, the mayor of Aracataka will propose to rename the city to Macondo and even hold a vote - however, the residents will not support his idea. And yet all of Colombia will be proud of Marquez - and on the day of the writer's death, the President of the country will write in his microblog: "A thousand years of loneliness and sadness over the death of the greatest Colombian of all time, I express my solidarity and condolences to the family."

Machine, hairdryer and mixer - for the novel

When Marquez conceived One Hundred Years of Solitude, he was almost 40. By that time, he had traveled half the world as a correspondent for Latin American newspapers and published several novels and stories, on the pages of which readers met the future heroes of Loneliness, Aureliano Buendía and Rebeca.

In the 1960s, the writer made a living working as a PR manager and editing other people's screenplays. Despite the fact that he had to support a family - a wife and two children, he took a chance and decided to embody the grandiose plan of a new novel. Marquez refused to work and mortgaged his car, and gave the proceeds to his wife so that she would provide him with paper, cigarettes and everything he needed every day. The author himself completely immersed himself in the work. For 18 months he went into "voluntary confinement" - the result of his work was the novel "One Hundred Years of Solitude".

When Marquez finished the book, he learned that the family was mired in debt. For example, they owed the butcher 5,000 pesos - a huge amount at that time. As the writer said, he did not even have enough funds to send the manuscript to the publisher - it required 160 pesos, and the author had only half the money. Then he laid down the mixer and his wife. The wife reacted with the words: "It was not enough that the novel was bad."

Soldiers of the times civil war in Colombia. 1900 year. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org / Desconocido

Magic Realism "One Hundred Years of Solitude"

The novel was not “bad”. True, before getting into the hands of to the right person, the text was rejected by several different publishers - apparently, they were "frightened" by the unusual manner of writing Marquez. His work mixes the real everyday life and fantastic elements - for example, deceased characters appear in the novel, the gypsy Melquíades predicts the future, and one of the heroines is taken to the sky.

Despite the fact that such artistic method As magical realism (namely, it was adopted by the writer) existed even before Marquez, writers did not very often resort to it. But the novel "One Hundred Years of Solitude" changed the attitude towards magical realism - now it is considered one of the "summit" works of this method.

Chronicle of one family

The author describes the history of seven generations of the Buendía family - the lives of heroes, whose lot has become loneliness. So, the first representative of Buendía, the founder of the city of Macondo, spent many years alone under a tree, someone spent the rest of his life locked in an office, someone died in a monastery.

The "starting point" for Marquez was incest, as a result of which a child with a "pig's tail" was born in the family. The legend about him is passed on by Buendía from generation to generation, however, between relatives again and again arise love relationship and incest occurs. In the end, the circle closes - after 100 years, another child with a "pig's tail" is born. On it the Buendía clan is interrupted.

15 years after the publication of One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez became the first Colombian to receive Nobel prize on literature. The award was presented with the wording "For novels and stories in which fantasy and reality, combined, reflect the life and conflicts of an entire continent."

Fragment of the cover of the novel by Gabriel Garcia Marxes "One Hundred Years of Solitude". Photo: flickr.com / Alan Parkinson

Introduction

Rafael García Márquez is a Latin American Colombian writer. "Magic realism" is the main element of Marquez's work. Rafael García Márquez believed that our world is the present, in which the real is combined with fantasy. People just need not to close their eyes to what exists around. After all, our fictions are not the same, and fictions are our life.

Realism in literature is a true portrayal of reality.

"Magic realism" is realism, in which elements of the real and the fantastic, the everyday and the mythical, the real and the mental, the mysterious are organically combined. The magical realism inherent in Latin American literature.

Analysis of the novel by G. Marquez "One Hundred Years of Solitude". "The real fantastic" in the novel

The foundations of Latin American magical realism are the beliefs, thinking of pre-Columbian Indian civilizations, such as the Aztecs, Maya, Chibcha, Inca. Already in works that have Indian roots, as if written by the Indians themselves, be it by Spanish writers - historians, priests, soldiers, right after the Conquest, all the components of a wonderful reality are found.

As a child, Marquez lived in a house inhabited by eccentrics and ghosts, and transferred this atmosphere to the pages of his novels. The fantastic elements of magical realism may be internally consistent, but are never explained. Using the unusually colorful, local, sensual material of Latin American reality, the writer shows the universal realities of human existence. The past contrasts with the present, the astral with the physical. The characters contrast with each other. The magical realism of Marquez is characterized by unlimited freedom, merges the sphere of mundane life and the sphere of the innermost spiritual world.

It was thanks to Marquez's novel "One Hundred Years of Solitude" that magic realism became known to the whole world.

The author recalled: “I don’t know why, but our house was something like a consultation on all the miracles that happened in the city. Whenever something happened that no one understood, they turned here, and usually the aunt gave answers to any questions. Here and then ( it comes about the case when a neighbor brought an unusual egg with a growth), she looked at the neighbor and said: "Oh, but these are basilisk eggs. Set fire to the hearth in the yard ...". I believe that it was this naturalness that gave me the key to the novel One Hundred Years of Solitude, where the most monstrous, most incredible things are told with the same equanimity with which my aunt ordered to burn a basilisk egg in the yard - a creature about which no one knew anything ". In a sense, the novel" One Hundred Years of Solitude "brought Marquez's childhood onto the pages of the book. row with the ordinary and thus make the incredible ordinary.This is a parable about absolutely real life filled with miracles that a person has forgotten how to see because of his "everyday glasses".

The ingenious combination of a fairy tale, parable, prophecy and deep philosophy in one novel is one of the components that brought Marquez the worldwide fame of the titan of world literature and the Nobel Prize.

The novel "One Hundred Years of Solitude" is the story of six generations of the Buendía clan, culminating in the death of the last representative of this clan. This novel is a traditional modern family chronicle, and the centenary history of the town of Macondo, and a reflection of the peculiarities of life Latin America... The novel begins in the 1830s. and covers a hundred-year history of the development of the town, Colombia, Latin America, all mankind on the example of one kind. The artistic concept of Marquez includes the idea of ​​the unnaturalness of loneliness, its destructiveness for the individual. The first generation of the heroes of the novel related to early XIX century, imbued with Renaissance hedonism and adventurism. Then, in the life of the next generations of the family, features of gradual degradation appear.

Time in the novel does not rise up, does not go either linearly or in a circle (it does not return to normal), but moves in a coiling spiral, the story goes reversed, regresses. Playing with time, manifesting reality through unusual movement time - characteristic feature magical realism.

In the novel "One Hundred Years of Solitude" we see not only the image of everyday life, social conditions and American mythology: it also contains something that is much more difficult to transfer into fictional narrative - the depiction of the moral restlessness of the American, an accurate portrait of the alienation that eats away at the individual, family and collective life of our countries. This shows the relevance of the works of Marquez in our time. He deliberately relies not on the elite, but on the mass reader - it is no coincidence that he turned to writing scripts for television series.

The culmination of the tragedy in the novel is the depiction of the shooting scene at the end of the "banana fever" era of three thousand strikers. When one of the heroes (Jose Arcadio), who miraculously escaped and got out from under the corpses, tells about what happened, no one believes him. It is characterized by the lies of the authorities about the fate of three thousand strikers and the laziness and lack of curiosity of the mind of the people, who do not want to believe in the obvious and believe in official statements government.

The hurricane destroys Macondo - the world that Marquez created. This is the last miracle of the novel. The death of Macondo is apocalyptic, but this death promises the emergence of something new.

“100 Years of Solitude” by Gabriel García Márquez is an incomprehensible book for me. Everyone admires it, but I still don't understand why I read it? Yes, it is written beautifully. In places it is just as fun to read as, for example, or “” with his inventions and mysticism. But damn it, either I'm not a connoisseur, or I don't understand anything at all in literature.

One Hundred Years of Solitude (Spanish: Cien años de soledad) is a novel by Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez, one of the most characteristic and popular works towards magical realism. The first edition of the novel was published in Buenos Aires in June 1967 with a circulation of 8,000. The novel was awarded the Romulo Gallegos Prize. To date, more than 30 million copies have been sold, the novel has been translated into 35 languages.

35 languages ​​of the world! Millions of books sold! How many samples of Gabriel García Márquez's 100 Years of Solitude have been downloaded? I've downloaded it too. It's good that I didn't buy! It would be a pity for the money spent.

Composition of the book "100 Years of Solitude"

The book consists of 20 unnamed chapters, which describe a story that is looped in time: the events of Macondo and the Buendía family, for example, the names of the heroes, are repeated over and over again, combining fantasy and reality. The first three chapters deal with the resettlement of a group of people and the founding of the village of Macondo. From 4 to 16 chapters tells about the economic, political and social development of the village. The final chapters of the novel show its decline.

Almost all sentences of the novel are built in indirect speech and are rather long. Direct speech and dialogues are almost never used. An interesting sentence from chapter 16, in which Fernanda del Carpio laments and pity herself, is two and a half pages long in print.

2.5 pages one sentence! Things like that are annoying too. The key theme throughout the book is loneliness. Here they all have different things. In Wikipedia, everything is even clearly described.

Throughout the novel, all of its characters are destined to suffer from loneliness, which is a congenital "vice" of the Buendía family. The village where the novel takes place, Macondo, also lonely and separated from the world of its day, lives in anticipation of the visits of the gypsies who bring new inventions with them, and in oblivion, in constant tragic events in the history of the culture described in the work.
Loneliness is most noticeable in Colonel Aureliano Buendía, as his inability to express his love forces him to go to war, leaving his sons from different mothers in different villages. In another case, he asks to draw a three-meter circle around him so that no one approaches him. Having signed a peace treaty, he shoots himself in the chest so as not to meet with his future, but due to his unluckiness he does not achieve his goal and spends his old age in the workshop, making goldfish in honest harmony with loneliness.
Other characters in the novel also endured the consequences of loneliness and abandonment:

• founder of Macondo Jose Arcadio Buendía(spent many years alone under a tree);
• Ursula(she lived in the solitude of her senile blindness);
• Jose Arcadio and Rebecca(went to live in a separate house so as not to disgrace the family);
• Amaranta(she was unmarried all her life and died a virgin) (here I would add - because it wasn’t good to fool everybody, she was a fool herself! :);
• Gerineldo Marquez(all my life I was waiting for the pension and love of Amaranta that had not yet been received);
• Pietro Crespi(rejected by Amaranta the suicide);
• Jose Arcadio II(after the execution he saw he never entered into a relationship with anyone and spent his last years locked in Melquiades' office);
• Fernanda del Carpio(was born to become a queen and left her home for the first time at the age of 12);
• Renata Remedios "Meme" Buendía(she was sent to the monastery against her will, but completely resignedly after the misfortune with Mauricio Babylonia, having lived there in eternal silence);
• Aureliano Babilonia(lived locked in Melquíades's room).

One of the main reasons for their lonely life and detachment is the inability to love and prejudice, which were destroyed by the relationship between Aureliano Babylonia and Amaranta Ursula, whose ignorance of their relationship led to the tragic ending of the story in which the only son, conceived in love, was eaten by ants. This family was not capable of love, so they were doomed to loneliness. There was an exceptional case between Aureliano II and Petra Cotes: they loved each other, but they did not and could not have children. The only way a member of the Buendía family can have a child of love is in a relationship with another member of the Buendía family, which happened between Aureliano Babilonia and his aunt Amaranta Ursula. In addition, this union was born in a love destined for death, a love that ended the Buendía family.
Finally, we can say that loneliness manifested itself in all generations. Suicide, love, hatred, betrayal, freedom, suffering, craving for the forbidden are secondary themes that throughout the novel change our views on many things and make it clear that in this world we live and die alone.

Novel… great romance and Gabriel Garcia Marquez! Ooooooo yeah. Am I the only one in my judgments? I tried to look for reviews of the book.