“The lady was very lucky that he didn’t burn her...” The network found out why Gerasim drowned Mumu

Ivan Zubtsov

Recent events are increasingly forcing Russians to turn to classical literature to find out if it predicted their catastrophic development. In this regard, an interesting topic was outlined in his next interview by a recent Nobel laureate, journalist Dmitry Muratov. He asked himself a banal and at the same time philosophical question: why did Gerasim drown Mumu? After all, the serf man still ran away from the lady. What prevented the unfortunate man from taking his beloved dog with him, and not drowning it?

Muratov saw in this story an allusion to the centuries-old model of relations between the Russian authorities and the people: humility, doom and non-resistance to cruelty and arbitrariness, on the one hand; and the desire to run away, hide and go into your own inner world - on the other. Such an interpretation of the textbook story of Turgenev, which children go through almost in the fifth grade of the school, caused a lot of comments on social networks.

Thus, the publicist Igor Tsareikin writes:

“I will not deceive, such thoughts about the Turgenev hero did not occur to me, although they lie on the surface. I re-read it again. I thought. Rational and logical explanation is not found. Alas.

Why kill Mumu, dooming both the dog and himself to suffering? Save yourself together, what's stopping you? An, no. Murder is a lesser sin than disobeying the will of the mistress. Here is such a tragedy of people's life, shown by Ivan Sergeevich. Explaining a lot in today's day ... In my opinion, Dmitry Muratov is right ... "

Journalist Yelena Romanova not only agrees with both Muratov and Tsareikin, she goes even further, summarizing:

“I have always considered Mumu the main work of Russian literature and I advise all foreigners to start with him, and not with the cumbersome Tolstoy or the depressive Dostoevsky ... “Leviathan”, by the way, is about the same ... Well, to understand the mentality, the national character. I have Dreiser for the USA, Dickens for Britain, Balzac for France. By the way, I have not decided on the Germans... They are all monumental.

The fact of the matter is that Robespierres and Hitlers pass away, but the peoples remain. And folk character - too. The Russians built their own Kafkaesque “Castle”, but I don’t represent Mumu in Germany. And the love that Schiller has, that Rozanov has is the same. With the amendment that the Germans had the Renaissance, romanticism and other crap, and Russian literature is the 19th century and a little of the 20th, and everything is very secondary, with a few exceptions... In other words, there is nowhere to look for the Russian character, but scrape the bottom. Mumu and Platon Karataev.

Gerasim is the archetype of the soul of a slave. In classical literature, it is of little interest to anyone, a narrow niche that has long been reflected upon. Literature and all art is about free will and the consequences of choice. A slave has no free will, no choice, he is secondary, and therefore of little interest. Nobody needs Gerasim outside of Russian literature. Only within the framework of the study of Russian history, culture, literature - i.e. that same national or cultural specialty…”

To match, and many other remarks, a small part of which we give below:

- If we recall that these Gerasims, before the incident with Mumu, were systematically forced to such behavior by fire, sword, violence of all kinds for about 500 years, then - alas and ah - it is not surprising.

- So, in fact, it was the obedient murder of the only kindred soul that freed him paradoxically. Before that, there was no thought that one could disobey. After that, everything became the same, he himself died. The lady was very lucky that he did not burn everything there, but he was already so dead inside that he did not even need revenge or punishment.

- It's amazing that they taught us at school that he did the right thing and Turgenev respects him for keeping his word. But when I came home and began to sob and vilify Turgenev, my sister's 19-year-old friend explained to me this about humility and what Muratov says. And that Turgenev did not mean at all that one had to keep one's word. I forgave Turgenev, but I could no longer fall in love