"Winter night" analysis of the work - theme, idea, genre, plot, composition, characters, problems and other issues are disclosed in this article.

B. Pasternak's poem "Winter Night", which is a fusion of philosophical and love lyrics, is included in the "notebook of Yuryev's writings" in the novel "Doctor Zhivago" and plays the role of an additional connecting element of the compositional structure of the work.

The exact date of the poem's creation is unknown. A number of researchers attribute his writing to the winter of 1946, linking the poem with the poet's last love and muse, Olga Ivinskaya. Other versions consider it appropriate to talk about 1954-1955, the time when work on the novel was completed. The poem gained fame after the first publication of the novel in the USSR in 1988.

In a poem that combines features impressionism And symbolism, closely intertwined themes of love and nature. Pasternak synchronizes the life of nature and human feelings: a blizzard outside the window accompanies a whirlwind of love passion, and bizarre snow patterns on the windows turn into patterns of shadows on the ceiling. Landscape sketches form a parallel with the inner world of man.

At the heart of the composition works lies antithesis fire and ice, two elements oppose and interact with each other. A cold blizzard of a universal scale sweeps everything around, covers the windows with a swarm of snow flakes. But a lonely candle still resists the elements of the surrounding world. IN ring composition The last stanza does not exactly repeat the first. In it, unlike the endless action in the first stanza ( "small, small...") the absence of a repetition and an indication of the time of action (February) marks the end, the end of the winter storm. The affirmation of the victory of hope and life is heard in the last line: "The candle burned".

The main idea of ​​the work- confrontation of a person with vital storms of both the external and internal world. The lyrical hero resists both the merciless blizzard and the inner "heat of temptation". The use of a number of words opposite in meaning ( "temptation", "angel", "crosswise") allows the poet to show the confusion of the hero's soul, trying to determine where good is, where evil is. A person can oppose the cold hostile world only with love and the fire of his soul. Cold and darkness recede before love, the world becomes cozy and recognizable in a homely way: here are shoes, and a night light, and a ceiling, and a candle.

The feelings of the lyrical hero are transmitted through candle image, carrying the most important semantic load: a candle, as a symbol of hope and quiet happiness, continues to burn on the table, despite the pressure of the outside world, becoming a symbol of the quivering fire of love that warms and illuminates human life. It is no coincidence that the image of a burning candle is pervasive in the novel, runs through the entire work and culminates in Yuri Zhivago's poem.

iambic tetrameter and alternation of male (first and third lines) and female (second and fourth lines) rhymes with cross rhyming convey the strong emotional tone of the poem. Breaking the rhythm- shortened second and fourth lines - give the work dynamism and expression.

The poem is full of various means of expression: metaphors (the heat of temptation, tears from the nightlight), personifications (shadows flocked, a blizzard sculpted on the table), epithets (illuminated ceiling, snowy, gray haze), refrain (“The candle was burning on the table. The candle was burning."). The poet introduces the "Winter Night" repeats ("small, small...") And inversion (the candle burned, flakes flew, shadows fell). Feel the images of the poem help alliteration sounds "m", "l", "s", "v" and assonance"e".

In one of Pasternak's most heartfelt poems, man and the Universe, the moment and eternity, merged together, making the flame of a candle burn as a symbol of life and hope.

(Illustration: Sona Adalyan)

Analysis of the poem "Winter Night"

Warm embrace of the hearth, soft subdued light. And darkness, cold, impartial and merciless winter darkness that knocks on the window. Break through, break in, extinguish and freeze, sweep and put to sleep - here it is, winter. These associations invariably pass from line to line, in different works of completely different poets. Somewhere warm and mischievous fun prevails, someone adds a pinch of holiday - and yet, winter is one in its image for the entire human race. For Boris Pasternak, this season is associated with difficult times. Not only personal problems, but the problems of the whole society, the whole country, which he loved so much and for which his soul ached so much - all this was reflected in the poem "Winter Night".

What is a winter night for Pasternak? Eight quatrains: short, bright, biting. Thirty-two lines, in which so much fit: both the light of a lonely mind, suffering from misunderstanding, and the fires of human destinies, trembling before an irresistible force. Specifically, strongly, without allegories and incomprehensible metaphors, Boris Pasternak reveals to us his winter night. It has no place for multifaceted allegories - only specifics. From the very first lines, the reader feels the beating of a winter heart, the all-encompassing breath of a blizzard. No, this is not the fury of nature, not the punishment of the gods, not universal infinity. This is winter, simple, ordinary and real.

It hits the windows with a blizzard, breaks through the cracks, sticks to the window frames with snow. “Like a swarm of midges in summer,” Pasternak emphasizes, telling the reader that nature does not know the difference between the seasons. Spring or autumn, summer or winter - everything is one. And a person in this huge unity feels his insignificance and loneliness, like a lonely trembling light of a candle. All the action of the poem is concentrated around this light, and the main emphasis is not on the cold of a winter night, but on the warmth of the fire.

The hot stylist emphasizes, concretizes the feelings that Pasternak wanted to express. Visual images have faded into the background - they are not as important as the description of a single moment. Moments in which human destinies intertwined. Lonely, vulnerable, they, like the heat of a candle, tend to intertwine together. And this aspiration pulsates with the rhythm of the heart, heaves with the chest, almost dying down under the onslaught of the wind that breaks through the cracks. But they don't stop. Let everything be lost in the snowy darkness, let the blizzard blow right on the candle - its flame burns and burns, and will burn as long as there is still love in the world.

This is precisely the quintessence* of Pasternak's Winter Night. Winter personifies the world that seeks to crush a person, throwing on him insurmountable obstacles and trials. But a person who is persistent, real, holistic is able to withstand everything and keep love in himself. Love for yourself, for others, love for winter, which seeks to extinguish the human flame. You can’t close yourself off, protect yourself, be offended - because then you can lose yourself. "Winter Night", being the fruit of the poet's emotional experiences, is a reflection of his idea that the human personality is strong, and no one has the right to blow out its flame or subdue it to its will.

* Note: Quintessence - (figuratively) the most important, the most important

Materials for the analysis of B. Pasternak's poem "Winter Night"

Melo, melo all over the earth
To all limits.
The candle burned on the table
The candle was burning.
Like a swarm of midges in summer
Flying into the flame
Flakes flew from the yard
to the window frame.
Snowstorm sculpted on glass
Circles and arrows.
The candle burned on the table
The candle was burning.
On the illuminated ceiling
The shadows lay
Crossing fates.
And two shoes fell
With a knock on the floor.
And wax with tears from the night light
Drip on the dress.
And everything was lost in the snowy haze,
Gray and white.
The candle burned on the table
The candle was burning.
The candle blew from the corner,
And the heat of temptation
Crosswise.
Melo all month in February,
And every now and then
The candle burned on the table
The candle was burning.

This poem is included in the poetic cycle, which completes B. Pasternak's novel "Doctor Zhivago". It is dedicated to O. Ivinskaya. The poem was written under the impression of the poet's meeting with O. Ivinskaya at his dacha in Peredelkino. Even then they realized that they could not live without each other.

This winter of 1945-1946. was a turning point in his life. Pasternak began work on the novel Doctor Zhivago, which would play a fatal role in his life. At the same time, he met Olga Vsevolodovna Ivinskaya, an employee of the editorial office of the Novy Mir magazine. He was then 56, she was 34 years old. O. Ivinskaya became the poet's sunset love, for the last 14 years of Pasternak's life she was his torment and passion, she became the prototype of the image of Lara in Doctor Zhivago. In one of the letters, he enthusiastically speaks of his beloved: “She is the Lara of my work, which I began to write at that time ... She is the personification of cheerfulness and self-sacrifice. It’s imperceptible from her that in her life (already before) she endured ... She is dedicated to my spiritual life and to all my writing deeds.

It was her dramatic fate that was reflected in the novel, and, in turn, the dramatic fate of the novel was reflected in her fate. Olga was arrested. Stalin left Pasternak free, but dealt him a treacherous blow by arresting his beloved. In early 1949, Ivinskaya was taken to the Lubyanka, allegedly because she wanted to arrange for Pasternak to escape abroad and run away with him. She was tortured in prison even though she was expecting a baby. Once, after another torture, she woke up in the morgue. Then she was told that there was a mistake, they brought her to the wrong place. But upon returning to the cell, severe pain began, and Olga Vsevolodovna lost her child. There was no end to the suffering of those who loved dearly:

As if with iron
Soaked in antimony
You were cut
According to my heart,” Pasternak wrote.

But there are poems by O. Ivinskaya that sound like an answer to a loved one:

Play all the keyboard of pain
And let your conscience not reproach you
For the fact that I, not knowing the role at all,
I play all Juliet and Marguerite.

Shortly after the arrest of Olga Pasternak, a heart attack struck, and Ivinskaya ended up in Mordovian camps for 4 years, from where she was released only after Stalin's death. In a letter to R. Schweitzer, the poet wrote: “She was imprisoned because of me. To get evidence against me. I owe it only to her courage that I was not arrested and that I have the opportunity to write.

And the fate of the novel was no less tragic. Doctor Zhivago was completed at the end of 1955 and sent to the editors of the Novy Mir magazine. The novel was rejected for ideological reasons, as Soviet literary ideologists saw in it a distorted image of the revolution. “The spirit of your novel is the spirit of rejection of the socialist revolution. The pathos of your novel is the pathos of the assertion that the October Revolution, the civil war and the latest social changes connected with them brought nothing but suffering to the people, and the Russian intelligentsia was destroyed either physically or morally ... ”- this letter from the editor was signed by B. Agapov , B. Lavrenev, K. Fedin, K. Simonov.

The manuscript of the novel ended up in Italy, where it was printed in Italian and Russian. The publication of the novel served as an additional basis for the Nobel Committee to award Pasternak the 1958 Prize "for outstanding achievements in modern lyric poetry and in the traditional field of great Russian prose." The persecution of the writer began.

The Nobel laureate was expelled from the Writers' Union. Under the threat of forcible expulsion from the USSR, in concern for the well-being and very life of people close to him, Pasternak refused the Nobel Prize.

I disappeared like an animal in a pen.
Somewhere people, will, light,
And behind me the noise of the chase.
I can't go outside
What did I do for a dirty trick,
Me, the killer and villain?
I made the whole world cry
Above the beauty of my land.
("Nobel Prize", 1959).

The poet was close to suicide. He was stricken with an illness from which he could never recover. In the last days of the poet, friends and letters from O. Ivinskaya supported him. B. Pasternak never left the family, because he considered it impossible for himself to "reunite on the wreckage of someone's collapse." Now, like 14 years ago, he confessed to her: “My golden charm, your letter is like a gift, like a jewel. It alone can heal, inspire, breathe life into me. This was written April 30, 1960. Exactly one month later, on May 30, he was gone. When O. Ivinskaya came to say goodbye to him, they silently parted before her. For everyone felt that this woman had "some kind of her own, very special rights to the deceased."

These words belong to Pasternak. This is the scene when the dead doctor Zhivago is buried in flowers for the last time by his Lara.

Of course, the poem "Winter Night" was written under the impression of a specific fact from the life of Pasternak. But, of course, it goes beyond the autobiographical. Sadly, neither O. Ivinskaya, the beloved of the great poet, nor B. Pasternak himself is no longer alive. But the candle, lit by the power of the poet's love, burns in spite of all the February blizzards.

This poem is amazing. Perhaps even from the first reading you do not comprehend his witchcraft. It is necessary to read, read a poem, preferably aloud. And gradually you fall under the magic of words, you are enchanted by magical music, you repeat like a spell:

Melo, melo all over the earth
To all extent...

And your mood miraculously changes, the soul seems to be cleansed, brightened, ascended:

Melo, melo all over the earth
To all extent...

Did you also fall under the bewitching rhythm of these lines? With the help of assonance, did you feel how the blizzard is crying, the wind is howling and the snowflakes are spinning? All this is created by the amazing sound writing of the poem. No wonder, argued M. Tsvetaeva, admiring the talent of Pasternak, he came from music. Pasternak brought "all inexpressibility" to poetry. Reading the poems of B. Pasternak, you go "by touch, at random." And, fearing to seem monotonous, I will give another quote from Tsvetaeva: “Pasternak is not readable by us, it takes place in us ... Pasternak fascinates. When we read Pasternak, we forget everything except Pasternak... The action of Pasternak is equal to the action of sleep. We don't understand it. We get into it. We fall under it. We fall into it." Because he is a cryptography, an allegory, a cipher.

Of course, one can enjoy Pasternak's "Winter Night" without comprehending the secrets of his poetry. But is it bad to understand how this poem enchants, why it captures, how it conquers? What does the fabric of the verse consist of, the most delicate "to the touch"? What verbal and sound picture rises before the reader? If students comprehend this science, then, in my opinion, their admiration for the poem will be deeper and more conscious. And the fact that the students are delighted with the “candle” burning on the table despite the February blizzards, I was able to make sure over the years of teaching in high school. Let me tell you about a recent incident. Winter. Outside the window snow. There is a lesson in the 11th grade. I don’t remember in connection with what topic, but we are talking about love, about the strength of this feeling. I suddenly suggest to the guys: “Do you want me to read you an amazing love poem?” I'm starting to read "Winter Night". When the verses were over, there was silence in the classroom. And then ... there was applause! Believe me, I was not happy for myself that it reached the hearts of my guys. I was proud that Pasternak delighted the guys! I am sure that there are not so many perfect verses in the world lyrics, where poetry and music are fused in absolutely ideal proportions. I think that this list will be headed by "The Stranger" by A. Blok and "Winter Night" by B. Pasternak.

There is nothing accidental with great poets. And if we are talking about Pasternak's sound writing, this does not mean that the poet rationally selected words that create the effect of a howling blizzard or paint a picture of a room illuminated by a candle. That is the miracle of brilliant lines, that the poet intuitively finds the only possible images, words, sounds, hears the music that emphasizes the semantic richness of the poem.

The lingering, lingering rhythm, amazing assonance (created by the sounds I, E) and alliteration (a technique based in this case on the repetition of the sounds M and L) of the first two lines at the beginning of the poem make us imagine the silence of the night, the lifelessness of space, where darkness and cold reign , the malice of a blizzard throwing snow flakes at the illuminated window:

Melo, melo all over the earth
To all limits....

In terms of meaning, tonality, and sound design, the second two lines sound like a contrast:

The candle burned on the table
The candle was burning.

The concentrated repetition of the sound A, open and wide, creates the effect of confrontation between light and darkness, heat against cold, fire against ice. These two lines, repeated four times in the poem, will become its leitmotif, the key to understanding the poet's main idea and will sound more insistent and life-affirming from time to time. The reception of gradation gives the poem the appearance of a spell, it is perceived as a challenge to fate.

So, already in the first stanza, everything that will be revealed in subsequent lines is encrypted. There are two main symbols in the poem - a blizzard and a candle. These symbols are ambiguous, they acquire a philosophical character, reach a universal scale. The poem is built on antithesis: two symbols, two worlds, two elements counteract and interact (the unity and struggle of opposites).

A snowstorm is not just a natural phenomenon, a candle is not just wax melting from fire. Pasternak emphasizes the transcendent nature of the blizzard, which “sweeps all over the earth”, obscures the light, misleads life's guidelines, threatens, chills the soul. She is hostile to comfort and warmth, seeks to extinguish the fire in the hearth, interferes with the union of kindred souls:

Like a swarm of midges in summer
Flying into the flame
Flakes flew from the yard
to the window frame.
Snowstorm sculpted on glass
Circles and arrows...

Again, the blizzard phenomenon was created by repeating the consonants L, M and the vowel E, I.

And even in a human dwelling, protected from the cold of the February blizzard, there is no peace: “shadows lay on the illuminated ceiling”, “it blows from the corner” on the candle, “wax ... from the night lamp” drips with tears.

What can a person oppose to a hostile world and a feeling of being lost in a cold space? Only love, "fate crossing", the fire of the soul.

When he and she meet, darkness and cold recede, the world becomes reliable, familiar, recognizable. Then the poet uses a different vocabulary. The author includes simple and familiar words in philosophical verses: ceiling, dress, shoes, night light, tears, wax. Being and life coexist here, complementing each other. Extremely concrete things, those that surround a person every minute, entering the poem, receive a figurative embodiment and become the personification of eternal truths. The ordinary reveals the significant and eternal... Pasternak "was fascinated by the task... to recreate the all-encompassing atmosphere of being..." (A. Sinyavsky).

The date scene is described with the utmost frankness, but also with extreme chastity and loftiness. We see a dress thrown on a chair, shoes that have fallen to the floor, flickering shadows that have merged together:

Shadows fell on the illuminated ceiling
Crossed arms, crossed legs,
Crossing fates.
And two shoes fell
With a knock on the floor.
And wax with tears from the night light
Drip on the dress.

With the help of sound painting, the sound of fallen shoes and the slow fall of wax drops are amazingly conveyed.

In a few lines - a love impulse of two close people looking for a stronghold in each other in a hostile world. As if an angel overshadows them:

The candle blew from the corner,
And the heat of temptation
Raised like an angel two wings
Crosswise.

The feelings of two are consecrated by the poet. He claims: the blizzard is powerless. She cannot blow out a burning candle. A worldwide blizzard and a fragile candle flame come into conflict, and light wins! A burning candle also develops into a symbol: it is a beacon for lonely travelers, a magnet for loving hearts, a landmark for those who yearn for light, a harbor for those who have gone astray, a pier for the desperate, tired and lost. The candle burns in spite of the evil forces. The image of a candle has a special meaning in Christian symbolism. Christ in the Sermon on the Mount says: “And having lit a candle, they do not put it under a vessel, but on a candlestick, and it shines on everyone in the house.”

At the end of the poem, which has a ring composition, the meaning of the blizzard's universality disappears. Ice is conquered by fire, darkness is driven out by light. A snowstorm is just a February blizzard, which will definitely recede under the pressure of spring. The absence of the repetition of “melo, melo” in the last stanza removes the feeling of hopelessness:

Melo all month in February,
And every now and then
The candle burned on the table
The candle was burning.

I really want to replace the dot at the end with an exclamation point, because confidence and strength come from the last lines, they affirm the idea of ​​the boundlessness of high feelings and the power of love, which does not submit to circumstances. The author discusses problems of an ontological nature, tending to philosophical generalizations. The artistic setting of Pasternak is the analysis of the relationship between man and the outside world. The poet is directed deep into the essence of the perceived phenomenon. This poem belongs to meditative lyrics. The lines of "Winter Night" are a kind of stream of consciousness that equally captures the phenomena of being and everyday life, external and internal, abstract and concrete. This is a kind of philosophical study with a life-affirming ending, in which elegiac reflections are combined with original landscape sketches, which form a parallel with the inner world of man.

The poem is metaphorical. The poet sees the ordinary world through the "magic crystal". Pasternak himself defined metaphorism as “a natural consequence of the fragility of man and the long-term conceived enormity of his tasks. With this discrepancy, he is forced to look at things in an eagle's vigilant manner and explain himself with instantaneous and immediately understandable insights. This is what poetry is. Metaphorism is shorthand for a great personality, cursive of her spirit. An ambiguous metaphor for Pasternak is the only possible means of capturing the ambiguous world around and inside a person.

The poem is written in iambic tetrameter, which most successfully conveys the emotional richness and excitement of the text. But the second and fourth lines in the stanzas are shortened and have all two feet. Perhaps this interruption of rhythm gives energy to the lines, makes the verses dynamic, expressive.

We note the alternation of male and female rhymes in the lines, depending on the location of the rhyme, we define it as a cross (ABAB).

There are few tropes in the poem: there are rare epithets that help create a color image:

illuminated ceiling - snow haze, gray and white; There is a comparison that characterizes the author's attitude to the feelings of the characters: the heat of temptation raised two wings like an angel...

It is interesting to follow the verbal structure of the text. There are no verbs denoting the actions of the characters. There are no nouns that name heroes. We learn about their existence and behavior with the help of noun phrases: shadows fell, arms crossed, legs crossed, shoes fell, wax ... dripped on the dress. The element hostile to lovers is described with the help of impersonal verbs, which emphasizes not the specific nature of the evil forces, but their universal scale: it is snowy, snowy all over the earth, a candle was blown from a corner.

So, before us is a fusion of philosophical and love lyrics. To what method and direction can this poetic masterpiece be attributed? Undoubtedly, the refined recreation of personal feelings and experiences, the metaphorical nature of the text that creates the mood, and the musicality allow us to speak of the poem belonging to impressionism. But we can also argue that the poem also has signs of symbolism: Pasternak's world is syncretic, it is not known with the help of rational methods, it is accessible only to intuition, it is revealed with the help of a hint, color scheme, music (the romanticism of the form suggests melodies to modern composers, there are even several good luck trying to set the poem to music). However, we see both the romantic feeling and the realities of life. Therefore, it is absurd to try to classify the poem unambiguously. Pasternak is bigger, wider, deeper than any final definition. He himself wrote in the book of lyrics “My Sister Life”: “I don’t care at all what the name of the force that gave the book is, because it is immeasurably larger than me and poetic concepts ...”

The candle of Pasternak's poetry burns in spite of all prohibitions and taboos.

And everyone can see this light and bask in this warmth, if it does not have “that mortal winglessness” that the poet and his hero Yuri Zhivago hated in people.

Analysis of B. Pasternak's poem "Winter Night"

The poem "Winter Night" is one of the most famous works of B. Pasternak and is better known for the first line "It is snowy, snowy all over the earth ...".

This poem is included in the poetic cycle, which completes B. Pasternak's novel "Doctor Zhivago". It is dedicated to O. Ivinskaya. The poem was written under the impression of the poet's meeting with O. Ivinskaya at his dacha in Peredelkino. Even then they realized that they could not live without each other.

This winter of 1945-1946. was a turning point in his life. Pasternak began work on the novel Doctor Zhivago, which would play a fatal role in his life. At this time, he meets Olga Vsevolodovna Ivinskaya, an employee of the editorial board of the Novy Mir magazine. He was then 56, she was 34 years old. O. Ivinskaya became the poet's sunset love; for the last 14 years of Pasternak's life, she was his torment and passion. Now their relationship is only part of the story, but the candle, lit by the power of the poet's love, burns in spite of all the February snowstorms.

This poem is loved and recognizable also because it has repeatedly been set to music. This is not surprising, since the work has a unique musicality. No wonder M. Tsvetaeva, admiring the talent of Pasternak, claimed that he came from music. Pasternak brought “all inexpressibility” into poetry, reading his poems, you go “by touch, at random.”

The musicality of the poem is given by the lines repeated by the refrain: "The candle was burning on the table, the candle was burning." In the sound shell of the work, one can single out alliteration for sonorant consonants [m] and [l], which give the poem an additional melodiousness and melodiousness.

The musicality of the poem is also given by its size - iambic four-foot, alternating with two-foot. This form also reflects the features of the key image of the poem - candles. The lines of the verse, like a candle flame, fluctuate on paper and create the illusion of movement.

Especially it is necessary to note the features of rhyme. It is cross, and thus, already at the sound and structural level of the poem, the motive of the cross, the crossing of destinies, makes itself felt. It is also important that we are dealing with the crossing of male and female rhymes. This coincidence is by no means accidental. The author shows the reunion of the heroes, the intersection of their destinies not only in the plot of the poem, but also in its structure.

However, if we go directly to the lexical component of the poem, we will pay attention to the fact that the author never literally mentions the two main characters. He seems to be talking about nothing and everything at the same time. We understand the picture of what is happening by hints: shadows, crossed arms, crossed legs, two shoes fell, wax dripped on the dress.

What happens to two people lost in the darkness of the night: is it a sin or is it God's grace. B. Pasternak gives an unequivocal answer. Let's turn to the fourth stanza.

Contrary to the laws of physics, the shadows do not fall on the floor, as we are used to, but on the ceiling, and this ceiling is illuminated. Thus, it turns out that two shadows rush to heaven, illuminated by some kind of God's grace. Love is born in sin, this is indicated by the sound of falling shoes, and the crying of a night lamp, and an incomprehensible breath on a candle from a corner, and the heat of temptation. But this heat of temptation is like an angel that takes lovers under its wing, gives them wings and allows them to break away from the sinful earth to fly up to the illuminated ceiling.

It is in these four stanzas (from IV to VI), describing the merging of lovers, that the motif of the cross appears. In the context of this poem, the cross is not a symbol of torment and suffering. Here the cross is like the intersection of two life roads, two destinies into one.

Obviously, there are two leading images in the work: the image of a candle and the image of a snowstorm, in fact, they are opposites of each other and create two parallel worlds that are not similar to each other.

The poem begins with the image of a blizzard. Its spatial characteristics are given: it is ubiquitous, the field of its activity is the whole universe. Everything is lost in the snowy haze - it is dark, impenetrable and frosty outside. The blizzard sculpts its patterns on the window glass, which means it is outside the house, outside it.

The candle world is extremely small - it's just a table, the candle is somewhere inside the house, on the other side of the window frame. The candle brings warmth (“And the heat of temptation / / He lifted, like an angel, two wings / / Crosswise”).

Let's try to go in the analysis of the poem to go after the author.

In the first stanza, there is an absolute antithesis: on the one hand, “It is snowy, it is snowy all over the earth to all limits,” and on the other hand, “The candle was burning on the table, the candle was burning.”

In the second stanza, the situation changes. A certain center appears - the fire of a candle - to which "like a swarm of midges in summer, flies to the flame, flakes flew from the yard to the window frame." And the reader, together with the snow, begins to strive towards this center.

Third stanza: "The blizzard molded mugs and arrows on the glass." And we, as it were, together with a blizzard, look out the window and observe what is happening.

It is worth paying attention to what figures the blizzard sculpts on the glass: circles and arrows. What associations arise.

Mugs like wedding rings are a symbol of the unity of two lovers into a single whole. However, a blizzard draws not only circles, but also arrows, and in biology there is a sign that indicates the reunion of a man and a woman.

And then - "a candle was blown from the corner" - a blizzard penetrates into the premises, it helps to flare up the heat of temptation even brighter. Thus, she becomes an accomplice to everything that happens. This view is confirmed in the last stanza:

Melo all month in February,

And every now and then

The candle burned on the table

The candle was burning.

Firstly, in a poem of 8 unions there is not a single opposing union, moreover, all eight are represented by a composing union and (if we replace: “But two shoes fell / / With a knock on the floor, / / ​​And the wax with tears from the night lamp / / On dripping dress "- the content will change dramatically). And the expression "now and then" raises the combination of these phenomena into a pattern. After all, if the action is transferred to a rainy autumn evening and a room lit by electricity, then the romantic halo will disappear, the holiness of the winter night will dissolve into non-existence.

In other words, two poles intersect: blizzard and flame, cold and heat, man and woman. The motif of the cross, rebaptism again makes itself felt.

Thus, the poem "Winter Night" is a poem about the extraordinary unity of a man and a woman, man and nature, that unity that is difficult to convey in prose, and which is so elusive, but so fully expressed in a short poem.

Interesting features of the works are opened by their "Winter Night" which is distinguished by a great depth of meaning. You will be convinced of this by reading this article. The photo of the author is presented below.

Winter night ... What appeared before your mind's eye when you said these words? Perhaps calmness and silence, cozy, light snow and a scattering of stars across the black sky? Or perhaps you imagined a snowstorm outside the window, a dance of the spirits of nature, a whirlwind of snow flakes and the only quiet marina in this place - a house with a candle burning on the table? ..

Time of creation of the work

The poem was written in 1946. The war has just ended. It would seem that nothing threatens the ensuing calm. However, the storms of world upheavals have not subsided yet and, perhaps, will never subside. Where to look for salvation? What can help a person not to get lost in the whirlpool of passions, to save the fragile Boris Pasternak gives the answer in this work: the hearth is the abode of peace and hope. However, this answer is ambiguous, as our analysis shows. Pasternak's poem "Winter Night" is much more complicated. To prove this, let's look at it in more detail.

Acceptance of antithesis

Let us return to the poem that interests us and try to understand what the author wanted to tell the reader, what thoughts Pasternak expressed in a harmonious series of rhyming lines. This work is a poem-doubt, flight, departure. It is no coincidence that it is built entirely on the reception of antithesis (opposition). From stanza to stanza, the repeated words "the candle burned ..." follow as a refrain. As you know, a candle is a symbol of hope, purity, solitude, quiet happiness. This light, which is the center of the Universe for the lyrical hero, is easy to put out. One light breath is enough for this. And now, "crosswise" raises "two wings", like an angel, "the heat of temptation."

Fire, heat - a symbol of passions, emotions. However, this is the "heat of temptation." But the fire of a candle is the torch of a solitary, quiet life. The author depicted in the work one element in two hypostases, diametrically opposed. However, the basis of the work is still the antithesis of ice and fire. This is confirmed by further analysis.

Pasternak's poem "Winter Night" in the first stanza has the following opposition: "it was snowing all over the earth" and "the candle was burning." In winter, a blizzard, a swarm of snow flakes immerse us in the first two lines of the poem. At the same time, the cold element is the queen of "the whole earth", the whole world, to which everything is subordinate. And only a single candle bravely confronts this snow queen, who is furious, outraged by this.

Who won?

The work is reminiscent of Pushkin's "Demons" by the confrontation between the struggle of the spirits of being and nature, the incessant wild dance and the candle, symbolizing the lonely human soul. However, the result is quite different here. If Pushkin's demons, depicted in the image of the elements, break the resistance of a lost traveler, turning his cart over, then here is a torch of hope, a small light, external forces cannot finally defeat. The last stanza is a repetition of the first: "the whole month was snowy" and "the candle was burning."

The main idea of ​​the work

Let's continue our analysis. Pasternak's poem "Winter Night" is characterized by the fact that the last two lines of these stanzas coincide, but not the first. Note that in the first stanza there is no sense of time - action merges with infinity. This is emphasized by the repetition of the word "melo". The poem "Winter Night" begins with the next line: "It's snowy, it's snowy all over the earth ...". Analyzing it, we note that in the last stanza, unlike the first, clear time boundaries are set ("in February"). In addition, the word "melo" is no longer repeated. This means that the winter storm is not endless, it has an end.

"The candle burned" as the final line affirms the victory of hope and life. This struggle, sometimes unjustified, worldly, ends with the victory of a pure source of light, which bravely defended the right to life. The main idea of ​​the work is precisely the opposition to various life storms of both the inner and outer worlds. The ring composition, as well as the emotional coloring of the poem, serve to reveal it. If you look closely at the work, listen to the sound of the words, you can understand that it is very colorful and bright.

The poetic size of "Winter Night", its features

Pasternak's poem "Winter Night" was written in "ancient, antediluvian" (words by Khodasevich) iambic, reflecting most of all a strong emotional coloring. What is it about this, it would seem? traditional... But pay attention to the 2nd and 4th lines of each stanza. You can see that they are shortened - only 2 feet. In the 1st and 3rd lines, in addition, a masculine rhyme is used, and in the 2nd and 4th, a feminine rhyme.

Of course, this is no coincidence. The paints in the poet's palette, which give brightness to the emotional mood of the work, are the techniques used. The lines are shortened, the antithesis of ice and fire is highlighted. She becomes noticeable, draws attention to herself.

Reception of alliteration

However, there is no rudeness and cruelty. This is facilitated by the reception of alliteration (repeating "e", "l"). This technique gives lightness, sonority to the blizzard. We hear the crystal sound of ice, but at the same time we feel lifelessness. It also plays on the antithesis - a device that makes Pasternak's poem "Winter Night" so expressive.

Analysis of the description of the external world

The antithesis is also used in the description of the outside world, which is colorless, cruel, fussy. In the snowy haze, "everything was lost." It's easy to disappear in this world, an abyss. He will absorb with ease everything unusual, alien to him. And when describing the world in which a candle reigns, the author uses words denoting domestic, simple things - these are "two shoes", "ceiling", "tears", "wax", "dress", "night light", etc. Here cozy and sweet, but even here the echoes of another world still reach, there is a place for doubts and struggle.

The inner world of a lyrical hero

The outer world of this poem is thus quite clearly outlined. If we analyze the nouns used in the work, then almost all of them refer to its description. On the contrary, it is quite difficult to imagine the inner world of the lyrical hero of this work. Almost nothing is said about him, he is given only in separate strokes. The reader can only guess about the feelings possessing the lyrical hero. Presented in this article by B. L. Pasternak "Winter Night" will help you with this. Penetration into the spiritual world of the lyrical hero makes us think and think. Like any other lyrical work by Boris Pasternak, "Winter Night" is characterized by a powerful philosophical potential.

"Heat of Seduction"

"The heat of temptation", doubts took possession of the soul of the lyrical hero. This heat is insidious, which for some reason is compared with an angel. Temptation, as you know, is the prerogative of Satan, and the angel is a symbol of purity and purity. Again, the symbol of purity is attributed to vice - the word "cruciformly". This is an indicator of the turmoil of the soul of the lyrical hero, who cannot understand where is good and where is evil. The only guideline, the only straw is for him a symbolic "candle", which serves as a stronghold of hope and faith. It depends on the hero himself whether it will go out or shine. It is precisely this idea that Pasternak's poem "Winter Night" ultimately leads to.

We will finish our analysis of it here, since we have described the main features of the work. We hope this information was useful to you. Pasternak's poem "Winter Night" can be described for a very long time and in detail. A full analysis of it reveals some other features. However, we noted the most basic and invite the reader to independently reflect on the work.