home Hair Christmas story in Russian literature presentation. Presentation on the topic “The Night Before Christmas” by N.V. Gogol. N.S. Leskov is one of the main representatives of this genre in Russian literature

Christmas story in Russian literature presentation. Presentation on the topic “The Night Before Christmas” by N.V. Gogol. N.S. Leskov is one of the main representatives of this genre in Russian literature

There was also a genre of Christmas story, Christmas tale, in Russia. The tone was set by the translated short stories of Dickens and Andersen, whom the Russian reader fell in love with extremely. In 1876, Dostoevsky wrote the Christmas story “The Boy at Christ’s Christmas Tree,” a true masterpiece of Christmas literature.

Unfortunately, he rarely wrote stories and thought in novels. And here I put the tragedy of this world into a few pages. “Christ always has a Christmas tree on this day for little children who don’t have their own tree there...” And he found out that these boys and girls were all just like him, children, but some were still frozen in their baskets, in which they were thrown onto the stairs to the doors of St. Petersburg officials, others suffocated in the chukhonkas, from the orphanage while being fed, others died at the withered breasts of their mothers, during the Samara famine, others suffocated in third-class carriages from the stench, and yet they are all here now, they are all now like angels, they are all with Christ, and He himself is in the midst of them, and stretches out his hands to them, and blesses them and their sinful mothers... And the mothers of these children still stand right there, on the sidelines, and cry; each recognizes their boy or girl, and they fly up to them and kiss them, wipe away their tears with their hands and beg them not to cry, because they feel so good here...” The boy is dying. The story was republished annually. It did not become popular children's reading, and could not have become; it is intended for prepared readers of Dostoevsky.

Here the motif of “feast during the plague” appears. For some - illumination, noisy holidays in palaces, for others - homeless frost, hunger, death. So much for “social motives”. But what about without them in our classics with its critical realism, which was not an empty invention of literary scholars?

Fyodor Mikhailovich also composed poetry. I did not strive for coherence and smoothness - as, indeed, in prose. What’s interesting is that he didn’t paint using stencils. “I read your poems and found them very bad. Poetry is not your specialty,” his brother wrote to him. But what makes them remarkable is that every now and then they turn into muttering. There is a naive, raw sentimentality in these poems - on the verge of parody:

Baby angel on Christmas Eve
God sent to earth:
“How will you go through the spruce forest,
- He said with a smile, -
You cut down the Christmas tree and the little one
The kindest on earth,
The most affectionate and sensitive
Give as a memory of Me.”
1854

Like the poems of Captain Lebyadkin, these lines will resonate in children's and absurdist poetry of the twentieth century. Besides, " God's gift"Dostoevsky still remains in the school reading repertoire.

Perhaps the best description of Christmas in the twentieth century is Alexei Tolstoy’s nostalgic “Nikita’s Childhood.” This is a sophisticated idyll. How in detail and lovingly the life-loving Tolstoy describes the preparation of toys, the happy ritual of Christmas, when children “moan with delight”: “They dragged a large frozen Christmas tree into the living room. Groin knocked and slashed with an ax for a long time, adjusting the cross. The tree was finally raised, and it was so high that the soft green top bent under the ceiling. The spruce smelled cold, but little by little its compacted branches thawed, rose, fluffed up, and the whole house smelled of pine needles. The children brought heaps of chains and cardboard boxes with decorations into the living room, placed chairs next to the tree and began to clean it up. But it soon turned out that there were not enough things. I had to sit down again to glue the pound cakes, gild the nuts, and tie silver ropes to gingerbread cookies and Crimean apples. The children sat at this work all evening, until Lilya, with her head down with a crumpled bow on her elbow, fell asleep at the table.” This was written in the unidyllic twenties. Then many people remembered their childhood; Tolstoy did this in an exemplary way.

In the pre-war years, Boris Pasternak rarely appeared in poetry. It was difficult to predict that he would be drawn to the “archaic.” The mask of Yuri Zhivago, the hero of the novel, allowed him to escape reality. However, Pasternak long ago learned to escape from it into fundamental translations, in Goethe and Shakespeare... He not only turned to a new aesthetic for himself, the poet’s worldview changed:

It was winter.
The wind was blowing from the steppe.
And it was cold for the Baby in the den
On the hillside.
The breath of the ox warmed him.
Pets
We stood in a cave
A warm haze floated over the manger -

This is how the canon of Christmas poems developed in the twentieth century. Warm, but not hot.

At the peak of anti-religious propaganda, Joseph Brodsky began to write Christmas poems “following Pasternak.” It was a long-term literary campaign, which he readily discussed: “I had an idea at one time, when I was 24-25 years old... to write a poem every Christmas... It was 1972...”. We must give him his due: the idea was almost realized. And Brodsky started even earlier: in 1962 he wrote the famous “Christmas Romance”, which, however, has almost no gospel texture. By that time he had not yet read the Bible. But a year later a poem appeared, oversaturated with biblical signs:

The Savior is born
in the bitter cold.
Shepherds' fires burned in the desert.
The storm raged and exhausted the soul
from the poor kings who delivered gifts.
The camels raised their shaggy legs.
The wind howled.
A star blazing in the night,
watched the three caravans on the road
converged into the cave of Christ like rays.

This is a kind of archaic manifesto, which in 1963 was perceived as a challenge. Poets then remembered the first cosmonauts much more often than the heroes of the Gospels, and the popularity of Christian aesthetics arose among the intelligentsia closer to the early seventies. Definitely, Brodsky was fascinated by “The Poems of Yuri Zhivago.” Khrushchev promised to present the “last priest” to society at any moment, and the valiant parasite, in the voice of a sexton, repeated biblical names like a spell.

Brodsky began to write poetry no less “unearthly” than Pasternak on behalf of Zhivago. This helped to avoid any manifestations of the Soviet situation, which the poet was terribly afraid of. He achieved his goal: Christmas poems were incompatible with the magazine market of the time. Snobbery towards Soviet reality became the reason for the biblical cycle. Brodsky’s best Christmas poems contain more of the urban whirlwind of the 20th century and less meaningful biblical enumeration:

At Christmas everyone is a bit of a magician.
There is slush and crush in food.
Because of a can of coffee halva
Besieges the counter
people laden with a pile of bundles:
everyone is his own king and camel.

Here it is rather a panorama of the New Year's Eve, rather than the Christmas bustle of Leningrad, although there is some gospel symbolism: when Brodsky remains in the museum space of ancient Bethlehem, he only repeats the melodies and rhythms of Yuri Zhivago. It turns out colder than Pasternak's.

And the best poem about Christmas, in my subjective opinion, was written by Mandelstam. He did without rhetoric, without “artistic retelling.” And the work turned out to be uneven. Uneven and nervous. Eight lines, fragmentary narrative. But real poems:

They burn with gold leaf
There are Christmas trees in the forests,
Toy wolves in the bushes
They look with scary eyes.

Once you read these lines, you will never forget them. Although they were not written for textbooks.

Arseniy Zamostyanov

Christmas as a symbol of premonition, expectation and, ultimately, the accomplishment of a miracle is a familiar plot in literature of various genres.

We decided to follow the evolution of this motif in Russian literature - and how it transformed over time.

FOLK TRADITIONS

Trutovsky Konstantin Alexandrovich.
“Carols in Little Russia” No later than 1864
Canvas, oil. 66 x 97 cm
State Russian Museum

The Church did not particularly encourage folk traditions, primarily because they were based on pagan rituals. Let us dwell separately on the most common of them - carols.

Apollo of Corinth in his work “People's Rus'” wrote that the concept of “kolyada” had different meanings depending on the region.

“Kolyada” (“koleda”) in the north is Christmas Eve; caroling is a ritual of going home on Christmas Day with congratulations and songs. In the Novgorod province, gifts received during these “walks” were called carols.

In the southern and southwestern zones, as Korinthsky notes, the Christmas holiday itself and even all Christmastide are called carols. In Belarus, “carol” means “to glorify Christ.” But in the Smolensk lands, “caroling” will mean “begging.”

They caroled all over Rus'. After all-night vigil or matins, young people walked in a whole crowd and organized “walks” or caroling. All this was accompanied by songs:

On the blue sea
Ship on the waters
There's a boat in that one
Three gates;

In the first gates
The month of Svetichi,
In other gates
Sonechko is leaving,

In the third gates
The Lord Himself walks
Taking the keys,
Paradise is here...

According to an ancient legend, as Corinthian writes, “on the eve of Christmas, at midnight, the gates of heaven open, and the Son of God descends to earth from the heights beyond the clouds.

During this solemn appearance, the “Blessed Paradise” reveals to the eyes of righteous people all its invaluable treasures, all its inexplicable secrets.

All the waters in the rivers of paradise come to life and begin to move; the springs are transformed into wine and endowed with miraculous healing powers on this great night; in the gardens of paradise, flowers bloom on the trees and golden apples pour in.

And from the borders of paradise, the sun that lives in them sends out its generous, rich gifts to the snow-covered earth. If anyone prays for anything at midnight, or asks for anything, everything will be fulfilled, it will come true, as it is written, says the people.”

Thus, the custom of expecting magical miracles at Christmas came out of folk customs and subsequently took root in literature as a powerful archetype. At the same time, direct descriptions of traditions are more often found in the plots of fairy tales.

AN ORTHODOX XMAS

Image Hosted by PiXS.ru
Vasily Vereshchagin. Nativity of Christ (fragment).
Cathedral of Christ the Savior, Moscow. 1875–1880

Another traditional image used in literature is the Orthodox Nativity. Despite the persistence of folk traditions, Orthodox Church it took only a few centuries for Christian rituals to become equally valuable - and subsequently dominant.

From the end of the 2nd to the 4th century, Christmas as an event was mentioned on the day of Epiphany - January 6, Clement of Alexandria writes about this. Christmas as a separate holiday, celebrated on December 26, was mentioned in the middle of the 4th century. In the Roman Empire, the pagan cult of the Invincible Sun was celebrated on December 25 - the day of the winter solstice.

We will find the most detailed story about the birth of Jesus Christ in the New Testament in Luke and Matthew (Gospel of Matthew, 1st chapter):

“In those days a command came from Caesar Augustus to make a census of the whole earth. This census was the first during the reign of Quirinius in Syria.

Joseph also went from Galilee, from the city of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, called Bethlehem, because he was from the house and family of David, to enroll with Mary, his betrothed wife, who was with child.

While they were there, the time came for Her to give birth; and she gave birth to her firstborn Son, and wrapped Him in swaddling clothes, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn” (Luke 2:1–7).

After the birth of Jesus, the first to come to worship him were the shepherds, who were informed of the birth of the Messiah by an angel, and a miraculous star appeared in the sky, which led the Magi to the baby Jesus. They presented gifts - gold, frankincense and myrrh, not as a baby, but as a King (Matthew 2:1-3).

King Herod of Judea learned of the birth of the Messiah, a new king. He ordered the killing of all infants under the age of two to destroy him. An angel appeared to Joseph and commanded him to flee to Egypt with his family, where they lived until the death of Herod (Matthew 2:16).

This event outline subsequently becomes a plot for re-interpretation by many authors, but is most often found in poetic works of different years.

CHRISTMAS IN SECULAR LITERATURE

Alexander Semenov. "At Christmas", 1975

Along with fairy tales Based on folk customs and Christmas stories with a canonical plot, an author's story is distinguished, the tradition of which came to Russia from Europe - along with the traditions of the secular holiday as such.

In the first half of the 19th century, authors still turned to the Russian Middle Ages, folklore and the theme of the fantastic and fairy tales. For example, in “Yuletide Stories” by Nikolai Polevoy (“Moscow Telegraph”, 1826, No. 23, 24), the plot tells about events in Veliky Novgorod.

At this time, stories with a Christmas plot had not yet gained mass popularity - only in the second half of the 19th century did the Christmas story take shape as a mass genre.

The founder of the genre in in this case Charles Dickens and Hans Christian Andersen are considered. The plot of the latter’s fairy tale - “The Little Match Girl” - can be seen in Dostoevsky’s story “The Boy at Christ’s Christmas Tree”, as well as in the story “Angel” by Leonid Andreev.

Christmas motifs are so firmly rooted in the literature of that time that works with a Christmas plot begin to be published in special Christmas collections and almanacs.

This is how the genre of the Christmas story is born. The tradition of family oral retelling of the story of the birth of Christ on the eve of the holiday had already existed for several centuries by that time, therefore, with the development of printing, the Yuletide story quickly took root and received its own history of formation.

A Yuletide STORY

Solomatkin Leonid Ivanovich. "Slavers"

In the name of the Yuletide story genre, there is an obvious reference to the concept of Christmastide. The Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary gives the following definition:

“Christmas time, that is, holy days - twelve days after the Feast of the Nativity of Christ, before the Feast of the Epiphany.

They are also called Christmas Eve, perhaps in memory of the events of the Nativity and baptism of the Savior, which took place at night or in the evening.

The church began to sanctify the twelve days after the feast of the Nativity of Christ in ancient times...”

The Christmas issues of the magazines “Igrushechka” and “Zasushevnoye Slovo” published the stories “Christ Visiting a Man,” “The Unchangeable Ruble,” and “The Fool” by Nikolai Leskov.

And Pavel Zasodimsky in 1883 published two volumes of children's “Intimate Stories”. Dmitry Mamin-Sibiryak writes children's Christmas stories for the collection “Zarnitsy. The second collection of stories for older adults."

Often Christmas stories were created not for entertainment, but for teaching children. The authors addressed Christian themes and based on them they created simple and understandable stories for children.

The format of the Christmas story was convenient for teaching - the themes of morality, holiness, kindness, self-sacrifice and honesty fit organically here.

At the same time, the Christmas story for many writers became a field for experimentation and a way to form a new literary direction.

STRUCTURE OF A TRADITIONAL Yuletide STORY

Fedot Sychkov. Khristoslavs (Children of the old village) (fragment). 1935

This construction of the plot was characterized by the “story within a story” structure - this was the most convenient way to separate the two realities of the story - the one in which the heroes of the story exist, and the fantasy one in which miracles happen.

Another characteristic feature of the plot of the Christmas story is the hero’s journey and the changes that happen to him during the Christmas night.

In this case, the miracle acts as the main driver of the plot - thanks to it, the hero looks back at his life and decides to change it. But this is a side story with an element of miracle; the story itself is told to us by the narrator.

In Nikolai Leskov’s story “Christ Visiting a Man,” the narrator is an old Siberian who believes in the truth of everything that happened to his friend Timofey Osipovich. Natalya Starygina gives an example in her analytical article:

“Timothy once read the Gospel in the garden. “It was here, at that very moment, that the beginning of the miracle happened, about which Timofey tells me this:
- I look, he says, around me and think: what abundance and contentment I have, and my Lord walked in such poverty...

And all my eyes were filled with tears and I couldn’t blink them away; and everything around me turned pink, even my tears. So - in a kind of oblivion, or fainting, I exclaimed: Lord! If you came to me, I would give myself to you. And suddenly, in response, from somewhere, like a breeze in pink, there breathed:
“I’ll come!”

This leads the reader to seek a realistic explanation for the miracle. It also happens that a legend with a miracle appearing in it gives way to the hero’s dream, as happens in the stories “The Unchangeable Ruble” by Nikolai Leskov, “Angel” by Leonid Andreev, “Makar’s Dream” by Vladimir Korolenko.

A miracle can be presented as a sick or too rich imagination of the hero, for example, “The Scarecrow” by Leskov, “The Boy at Christ’s Christmas Tree” by Dostoevsky.

And sometimes a miracle is a hoax, as in the story “The Artist and the Devil” by Anton Chekhov, and sometimes it is just a lucky coincidence, as, for example, in Leskov’s stories “The Pearl Necklace” and “The Old Genius”.

Sometimes, instead of a miracle, the hero encounters people who are ready to help in Hard time, because Christmas is a time of kindness and compassion. A miracle may not be part of a Christmas story at all - writers turn to realism and prefer to show episodes from life - for example, the stories “Before the Stove”, “Lovebirds”, “On the High Road” by Pavel Zasodimsky.

With a star. Reproduction from a painting by Mikhail Germashev.
1916

Leskov’s story “Deception” also begins with the following structure: “Just before Christmas we were traveling south and, sitting in the carriage, reasoning...”

For example, in the story “The Beast” by Leskov (1883), the priest’s sermon melted the heart of a stern man and changed his attitude towards life and towards his loved ones. The story “Christ Visiting a Peasant” (1881) ends with the author’s moral:

“This is how the man was taught to build a manger in his heart for Christ born on earth. And every heart can also be such a manger if it fulfills the commandment: “love your enemies, do good to those who have offended you,” and Christ will come into his heart, as into a chosen upper room, and will make himself an abode there.”

By the beginning of the twentieth century, along with socio-political changes in the country, the genre declined.

The tradition of Christmas itself is gradually being abolished, and the emphasis in winter holidays shifts to New Year, which, like a relay race, takes on the custom of decorating a Christmas tree, giving gifts, believing in miracles - and becomes, in turn, the central plot for a number of magical, now New Year's, works.

The holiday of the Nativity of Christ occupies a large place in the life of the whole world. All over the globe, wherever the name of Christ is preached, this great day is celebrated, and every year, with every repetition of this holiday, it brings with it, as it were, a fresh stream of love and light. In every home, in every family, preparations are made for this day every year, children look forward to it with joyful impatience, parents think with love about the pleasure ahead for their children, the thought of a festive tree fills all hearts.

Goal of the work : tell about the history of the holiday, its traditions, illustrate it with the works of outstanding Russian painters.

There is a Christmas haze all around.

Bells ring in the darkness,

And get along with them

The words sound: “Peace on earth and happiness to all”

Every time we step over

the threshold of the New Year, my soul becomes

especially warm, because after a few

Days away the Christmas holiday will come! Christmas is amazing

a time when the heart is filled with anticipation

miracle... And this miracle happens!..“Christ is born, praise!” - rushes over the Universe, - “Christ from heaven, meet me!” - the whole world sings the glory of the Creator. Angelic powers and the human race together glorify Him whose love has no boundaries. And that's probably why it's Christmas Christ is called “Winter Easter”.

Light was an important component of pagan winter holidays. With the help of candles and fires they drove out the forces of darkness and cold. In Christianity, candles are considered an additional symbol of the importance of Jesus as the Light of the world. Christmas candles signify the victory of light over darkness. The candles on the tree of paradise gave birth to our beloved Christmas tree. .

Meanwhile, people arrived in Jerusalem from

some eastern country, the Magi, or

sages. Studying the stars. The saw,

how a new unusual star appeared in the sky

and realized that the expected Messiah had been born.

The Jewish king Herod, having heard about the appearance of an unusual star, and, therefore, about the birth of a new king, was afraid that his power would be taken away from him, because he was not a Jew. Herod sent the wise men to Bethlehem to find out about the Child. He planned to kill him.

The same star walked across the sky before the Magi, showing them the way, and led them exactly to where the born baby Jesus was.

Many poets and writers directly or indirectly addressed the theme of Christmas. The works of A. A. Fet “Christmas” and I. A. Bunin “New Year” will be transferred to the nostalgic world of the patriarchal Russian holiday.

IN In Russian poetry of the 20th century, Boris Pasternak and Joseph Brodsky addressed the gospel theme.

Joseph Brodsky made a kind of vow, and almost every year, throughout his poetic life, he always wrote a Christmas poem.

The Nativity of Christ, the day when the Savior appeared in our world, is a great event for every Christian. The church service of the holiday and numerous icons of the Nativity of Christ, which have repeatedly become the subject of attention of researchers, theologians and art critics, and the theme for art exhibitions, are filled with a feeling of joy and jubilation.

The iconography of the Nativity of Christ developed gradually, as did the divine service of the holiday, however, its main features emerged already in the early Christian period. The main sources of iconography were the Gospel and church tradition.

Nativity. Vishnyakov I.Ya.

Nativity

Lukovnikova E. Iconography of the Nativity of Christ // Alpha and Omega, 1994.
Orlova M.A. On the formation of the iconography of the Christmas stichera “What shall we bring to You...” // Old Russian Art. Balkans. Rus. St. Petersburg, 1995
V.V. Frost "Big children's encyclopedia of New Year and Christmas celebrations."
History of the Christmas holiday. Yakov Ushakov
Nativity. Konstantin Pobedonostsev
http://www. R r A vmir.ru
Encyclopedia "Around the World"

Publications in the Literature section

How Christmas came to literature

Christmas as a symbol of premonition, expectation and ultimately the accomplishment of a miracle is a familiar plot in literature of various genres. We decided to follow the evolution of this motif in Russian literature - and how it transformed over time.

Folk traditions

Konstantin Trutovsky. Carols in Little Russia. 1864

Folklore customs and rites of celebration occupy a separate place in literature - partly thanks to the story “The Night Before Christmas” by Nikolai Gogol, who in Russia became one of the first authors to make the eve of the holy holiday the basis of a literary plot. The Church did not particularly encourage folk traditions, primarily because they were based on pagan rituals. Let us dwell separately on the most common of them - carols.

Apollo of Corinth in his work “People's Rus'” wrote that the concept of “kolyada” had different meanings depending on the region.

“Kolyada” (“koleda”) in the north is Christmas Eve; caroling is a ritual of going home on Christmas Day with congratulations and songs. In the Novgorod province, gifts received during these “walks” were called carols. In the southern and southwestern zones, as Korinthsky notes, the Christmas holiday itself and even all Christmastide are called carols. In Belarus, “carol” means “to glorify Christ.” But in the Smolensk lands, “caroling” will mean “begging.”

They caroled all over Rus'. After all-night vigil or matins, young people walked in a whole crowd and organized “walks” or caroling. All this was accompanied by songs:

On the blue sea
Ship on the waters
There's a boat in that one
Three gates;
In the first gates
The month of Svetichi,
In other gates
Sonechko is leaving,
In the third gates
The Lord Himself walks, -
Taking the keys,
Paradise is here...

According to an ancient legend, as Corinthian writes, “On the eve of Christmas, at midnight, the gates of heaven open, and the Son of God descends to earth from the heights beyond the clouds. During this solemn appearance, the “Blessed Paradise” reveals to the eyes of righteous people all its invaluable treasures, all its inexplicable secrets. All the waters in the rivers of paradise come to life and begin to move; the springs are transformed into wine and endowed with miraculous healing powers on this great night; in the gardens of paradise, flowers bloom on the trees and golden apples pour in. And from the borders of paradise, the sun that lives in them sends out its generous, rich gifts to the snow-covered earth. If anyone prays for anything at midnight, asks for anything, everything will be fulfilled, it will come true, as it is written, says the people.”.

An Orthodox xmas

Vasily Vereshchagin. Nativity of Christ (fragment). Cathedral of Christ the Savior, Moscow. 1875–1880

Another traditional image used in literature is the Orthodox Nativity. Despite the vitality of folk traditions, it took the Orthodox Church only a few centuries for Christian rituals to become of equal value - and subsequently dominant.

We will find the most detailed story about the birth of Jesus Christ in the New Testament in Luke and Matthew (Gospel of Matthew, 1st chapter):

“In those days a command came from Caesar Augustus to make a census of the whole earth. This census was the first during the reign of Quirinius in Syria. Joseph also went from Galilee, from the city of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, called Bethlehem, because he was from the house and family of David, to enroll with Mary, his betrothed wife, who was with child. While they were there, the time came for Her to give birth; and she gave birth to her firstborn Son, and wrapped Him in swaddling clothes, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn” (Luke 2:1–7).

This event outline subsequently becomes a plot for re-interpretation by many authors, but is most often found in poetic works of different years.

Christmas in secular literature

Alexander Semenov. On Christmas. 1975

Christmas motifs are so firmly rooted in the literature of that time that works with a Christmas plot begin to be published in special Christmas collections and almanacs. This is how the genre of the Christmas story is born. The tradition of family oral retelling of the story of the birth of Christ on the eve of the holiday had already existed for several centuries by that time, therefore, with the development of printing, the Yuletide story quickly took root and received its own history of formation.

Yule story

Leonid Solomatkin. Slavers (fragment). 1868

In the name of the Yuletide story genre, there is an obvious reference to the concept of Christmastide. The Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary gives the following definition:

“Christmas time, that is, holy days - twelve days after the Feast of the Nativity of Christ, before the Feast of the Epiphany. They are also called Christmas Eve, perhaps in memory of the events of the Nativity and baptism of the Savior, which took place at night or in the evening. The church began to sanctify the twelve days after the feast of the Nativity of Christ in ancient times...”

Almost all major writers who worked in periodicals in the second half of the 19th century wrote Christmas stories: Nikolai Leskov, Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin, Gleb Uspensky, Anton Chekhov, Dmitry Mamin-Sibiryak, Vladimir Korolenko, Pavel Zasodimsky, Leonid Andreev, Maxim Gorky . The Christmas issues of the magazines “Igrushechka” and “Zasushevnoye Slovo” published the stories “Christ Visiting a Man,” “The Unchangeable Ruble,” and “The Fool” by Nikolai Leskov. And Pavel Zasodimsky in 1883 published two volumes of children's “Intimate Stories”. Dmitry Mamin-Sibiryak writes children's Christmas stories for the collection “Zarnitsy. The second collection of stories for older adults."

Often Christmas stories were created not for entertainment, but for teaching children. The authors turned to Christian themes and created stories based on them that were simple and understandable to children. The format of the Christmas story was convenient for teaching - the themes of morality, holiness, kindness, self-sacrifice and honesty fit organically here.

Subsequently, the genre of Christmas stories began to develop in two directions. The genre of the story itself became so widespread that all writers - both professional and beginners - turned to it, so that Christmas stories turned into easy sentimental reading without any special literary delights. At the same time, the Christmas story for many writers became a field for experimentation and a way to form a new literary direction.

The structure of a traditional Christmas story

Fedot Sychkov. Khristoslavs (Children of the old village) (fragment). 1935

Initially, the Christmas story was formed according to the principle of realism - there was no place for miracles, fantasies, mysticism, or the supernatural. If some miracle was part of the plot, then in the end it was explained and turned out to be not a miracle at all. Often, the authors explained this move by the fact that the mystical flair of Christmas originates in folk beliefs and rituals that were popular at the dawn of Christianity. This construction of the plot was characterized by the “story within a story” structure - this was the most convenient way to separate the two realities of the story - the one in which the heroes of the story exist, and the fantasy one in which miracles happen.

Another characteristic feature of the plot of the Christmas story is the hero’s journey and the changes that happen to him during the Christmas night. In this case, the miracle acts as the main driver of the plot - thanks to it, the hero looks back at his life and decides to change it. But this is a side story with an element of miracle; the story itself is told to us by the narrator.

“Timothy once read the Gospel in the garden. “It was here, at that very moment, that the beginning of the miracle happened, about which Timofey tells me this:
“I look,” he says, “around me and think: what abundance and contentment I have in everything, and my Lord walked in such poverty... And all my eyes were filled with tears and I could not blink them away; and everything around me turned pink, even my tears. So - in a kind of oblivion, or fainting, I exclaimed: Lord! If you came to me, I would give myself to you. And suddenly, in response, from somewhere, like a breeze in pink, there breathed:
“I’ll come!”

It happens that the miracle itself is the internal narrative of the storyteller or the memory of the Christmas story. Moreover, a miracle is a prerequisite for this legend, then the reader will perceive it as something not related to the reality of the story. This leads the reader to seek a realistic explanation for the miracle. It also happens that a legend with a miracle appearing in it gives way to the hero’s dream, as happens in the stories “The Unchangeable Ruble” by Nikolai Leskov, “Angel” by Leonid Andreev, “Makar’s Dream” by Vladimir Korolenko. A miracle can be presented as a sick or too rich imagination of the hero, for example, “The Scarecrow” by Leskov, “The Boy at Christ’s Christmas Tree” by Dostoevsky. And sometimes a miracle is a hoax, as in the story “The Artist and the Devil” by Anton Chekhov, and sometimes it is just a lucky coincidence, as, for example, in Leskov’s stories “The Pearl Necklace” and “The Old Genius”. Sometimes, instead of a miracle, the hero encounters people who are ready to help in difficult times, because Christmas is a time of kindness and compassion. A miracle may not be part of a Christmas story at all - writers turn to realism and prefer to show episodes from life - for example, the stories “Before the Stove”, “Lovebirds”, “On the High Road” by Pavel Zasodimsky.

With a star. Reproduction from a painting by Mikhail Germashev. 1916

As a rule, in a Christmas story, all events unfold during one Christmas night, during which the characters change their lives and their principles. For example, this happens in Alexander Chekhov’s stories “Trishka’s Soul”, “Lawbreaker”, “Severe Sin”, “Star”, “Night Chime”. Later, authors became more inventive in the plot conventions of the Christmas story. For example, in the story “The Artist and the Devil,” the action begins four days before Christmas.

In a Christmas story we can meet characters who do not know each other, but it is on Christmas night that their stories intersect, as in Alexander Chekhov’s story “Christmas Eve in a Snowdrift” and Nikolai Leskov’s story “Selected Grain.” Leskov’s story “Deception” also begins with the following structure: “Just before Christmas we were traveling south and, sitting in the carriage, we were talking...”

However, no matter how the structure of the Christmas story changes, no matter how the principles of plotting change, the main thing in the genre remains one thing - the moral and instructive component. At the end of the story, there is invariably a moral - that for the sake of which the heroes survived all the Christmas adventures, for the sake of which miracles were performed. For example, in the story “The Beast” by Leskov (1883), the priest’s sermon melted the heart of a stern man and changed his attitude towards life and towards his loved ones. The story “Christ Visiting a Peasant” (1881) ends with the author’s moral:

“This is how the man was taught to build a manger in his heart for Christ born on earth. And every heart can also be such a manger if it fulfills the commandment: “love your enemies, do good to those who have offended you,” and Christ will come into his heart, as into a chosen upper room, and will make himself an abode there.”

By the beginning of the twentieth century, along with socio-political changes in the country, the genre declined. The tradition of Christmas itself is gradually being abolished, and the emphasis in the winter holidays is shifting to the New Year, which, like a relay race, takes on the custom of decorating a Christmas tree, giving gifts, believing in miracles - and becomes, in turn, the central plot for a number of magical, now New Year's, works.

Marina Filimonova

For children of senior preschool and primary school age.

Goals: 1. Give an idea of the biblical event.

2. Introduce children With folk traditions and customs associated with this holiday.

3. Cultivate a sensitive attitude towards others.

4. Enrichment of the dictionary through the selection of synonyms and antonyms; explanations of idiomatic expressions.

5. Manufacturing Christmas gifts.

Equipment: equipment for demonstration presentations, layout nativity scene, materials and tools for making crafts.

Preliminary work: a series of conversations are held with children on the basics Orthodox culture, where children an elementary idea of who is called God and angels is given; children memorize the poems used in the teacher's story.

Move: Children sit in front of the screen. The teacher's story follows, illustrated presentation.

Text for presentation « Children about Christmas» .

Guys, after the New Year in January there is another holiday. Who knows which one? Yes it Christmas. Today we will talk about this holiday.

The song by E. Koroleva is playing "Glorious night Christmas» .

Teacher's story: Word « Christmas» stands for "day birth» . When is your day birth, you and all your loved ones rejoice. But once upon a time was born on Earth baby, to which very, very many people rejoiced, because it was God. And it was like that. A long time ago, in a distant eastern country, there lived three sages and stargazers. They were called "Magi". From their books they knew that someday God would be born on earth. And so that all people can know when this will happen, a new star. And so the wise men looked into the sky every night, they knew every star. But one day they saw a new extraordinary star. She was bigger and brighter than all the others. And, lo and behold, she did not stand still, but floated across the sky, as if inviting her to follow her. (Frame 2). And the Magi set off to see God with their own eyes. In those days there were no cars, much less airplanes. The Magi equipped the camels and set off on the road. Their path was difficult and long. But the star led them, and if the Magi were tired, she stopped to give them rest. (Frames 3-5).

Meanwhile, in the country of Judea, the formidable King Herod decided to find out how many people live in his country, how many people are subject to him. To avoid confusion, Herod ordered everyone to come to the city where they were born. The young woman Mary also went to her hometown of Bethlehem. It was difficult for her to walk, because her baby was soon to be born, but it was impossible not to obey the king’s order. (Frame 6). A large crowd of people gathered in the city of Bethlehem, all the hotels, all the inns were occupied. Mary and her companion Joseph walked from house to house, but no one gave them a place to stay for the night. (Frames 7-8).

Question children: Do you guys think it was possible to help Maria somehow? Or is there nothing you can do since there is no space?

Suggested answer children: Someone could give her a seat.

Educator: Of course, guys, strong young men could give her their place. And any kind person could do this. But the trouble is, there wasn’t a single kind person in the whole city. All people were evil. That is why God himself came to earth to cure people of anger, greed, and envy.

Question: And what words close in meaning can be chosen to the word "wicked"?

Answers children: Bad, no good, angry, unkind, worthless.

Educator: That's right, guys. But there is one more word - "hard-hearted". This means that a person's heart is as hard as stone. Just like a stone doesn’t feel anything, the heart sometimes doesn’t feel the pain or grief of another person. But I don’t even want to talk about those. Let's better choose words that match the meaning of the word "Kind".

Answers children: Nice, gentle, affectionate.

(Children often say "Kind" select a synonym "Beautiful". It is appropriate to remind here children a fairy tale about"To the Dead Princess" Pushkin or a fairy tale "Snow White and the 7 Dwarfs". In these fairy tales, the stepmother was very beautiful and very evil. You can also remember the fairy tale "The Scarlet Flower" Aksakova or cartoon "The beauty and the Beast", where the positive character turned out to be in the form of a monster.)

Educator: Also, guys, there are such good ones words: "kind-hearted", "sensitive". What do you think about a good or evil person? they will say: "Does he have a heart of gold?" Why?

Answers waiting for them.

Educator: Indeed, gold is a jewel. People also value a kind heart dearly, more expensive than beauty faces. There is no such expression - "golden face". About skillful people they will say: "skillful fingers", about smart people - "golden head". About the good ones - "golden man", "Golden heart", and here "golden face" they don't talk about anyone.

But let's return to the city of Bethlehem. Poor Maria, not finding shelter, left the city. She found refuge in a poor cave (on ancient language the cave was called "nativity scene", where shepherds took refuge from bad weather along with their flocks. (Frame 9). There was no one in the cave at that time. When Maria's baby was born, the young mother swaddled him and placed him on soft straw in an animal feeder. After all, there was no crib there. (Frame 10). This feeder was called "nursery". Are you familiar with this word? Yes, the most younger group in kindergarten called "nursery", in honor of this very trough where he lay newborn god. At this time, the angels told the shepherds the good news that God was born in their cave. (Frame 11). At first the shepherds were afraid, but then they were happy and ran to their cave. The Magi also came to the cave. Everyone wanted to see baby god who was named Jesus Christ. (Frame 12).

A poem is being read:

Let's forget both grief and sadness,

Born today baby jesus.

He was born at night, in a cold cave,

He was surrounded only by birds and animals,

Yes, angels, yes, shepherds and wise men.

Which means all people, which means we too

They stood quietly and silently watched

To a wondrous miracle in Holy Bethlehem.

Educator: We can visit this cave now. You just need to buy a ticket to the country of Israel in the city of Bethlehem. A temple was built above this cave. Let's go into it. (Frame 13). Do you see the star on the floor? They say this is the very place where the manger stood baby christ. The Magi brought gifts with them. These gifts are now kept in the country of Greece on the holy Mount Athos. (Frames 14, 15). Now, in remembrance of these gifts, it is accepted give children gifts at Christmas too. Many other good customs are associated with the holiday Christmas. For example, the custom of decorating a Christmas tree. (Frame 16). How did this custom appear? There are many different scientific assumptions and even fairy tales about this. I want to tell you one of them. When God was born, not only people and animals wanted to worship him, but even plants. One palm tree said: “I will bring my beautiful leaves as a gift to God, they will be a fan for him during the heat.” Other answered: “And I’ll bring him my sweet dates.”. Herringbone said: "I also want to bow to the newborn God» . Proud palms laughed: “Why are you going? What can you give? Your branches are so prickly, and your cones are inedible!” But the Christmas tree was kind, she was not angry with her boastful friends and only I thought: “Well, really, I’m not as beautiful as the palm trees. My dress is poor and scratchy. But I really want to see God. I’ll look at him at least from afar.” And God rewarded the Christmas tree for its modesty and kindness. Stars descended from the sky onto the shaggy branches of the Christmas tree and decorated it with themselves. The Christmas tree became the most beautiful and elegant, but did not become proud. She wears her wonderful outfit only once a year for a holiday. Christmas. And at the top of the tree there is always an eight-pointed star, similar to the one that led the Magi to Bethlehem. Another custom is associated with this wonderful star. The day before Christmas(this day is called Christmas Eve, some people do not eat anything until the first star sparkles in the sky, which seems to say that God has already been born. (Frame 17).

Poems read by E. Koroleva "What an amazing evening"(abbreviated).

What an amazing evening

The icicles ring quietly.

And the trees in the distance are like candles

Covered with snow they stand.

And suddenly for some reason it seems

Over there, lighting up the sky,

It's like a wonderful star

It will float across the sky now.

At that moment the whole earth will shine,

There will be no grief, no tears,

After all, everyone in the world will know -

The Savior Christ was born.

People wait so much for this hour that they even forget about food. Before the holiday, children made a toy nativity scene (Frame 18, plus showing a nativity scene made by me). After Christmas children and youth dressed up, made a large star of Bethlehem and went from house to house with this star, singing Christmas carols. These are the songs in which they praised newborn God Christ. For this the guys were called Christoslavs. The owners presented Christoslav with sweets, gingerbread, and nuts. (Frame 19). Week after Christmas was called Holy Week, or, popularly, "Yuletide". It was believed that these days God himself walks the earth and helps everyone. And people at this time tried to do good deeds, delight your loved ones with food and gifts. (here it is possible to demonstrate a short game video film « Christmas angel» or start recording a song "Christmas tree in Christmas» ). Do you guys want to cook too? Christmas presents? (Children move to tables and make crafts).